The Weasley Kind of Help
by TwoTrees
Summary: They got through the war, but now they have to face an even greater challenge - Fred & George decide it's their time to save the world. Do their friends have any chance of surviving this? AU to DH
1. Hamster Eau de Nil

_Disclaimer:_ Don't own anything from the HP books, not even a snorkack.

* * *

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 1: Hamster Eau de Nil**_

The door banged open. A second later the door banged shut. Quick steps between the shelves indicated someone or something approaching. Then it moved into the open, and by the look of it, turned out to be a red swamp monster.

"Hello, Red Swamp Monster," Fred greeted it.

"Shut up, Fred!" the swamp monster seemed to be in a bad mood. Although not in the worst of moods because it wasn't yelling and trashing around. Yet. But it wasn't very far from that, and taking the advice, Fred closed his mouth and kept silent.

"Tell me," the monster demanded, "have you seen Harry recently?"

"Ooh, lovers' trouble!" Fred hooted, momentarily forgetting who he was dealing with. He was saved the trouble of remembering that by himself, though, as suddenly a bottle of something bounced off his forehead.

"Hey, don't do that!" he cried, picking it up from the floor. "_Smelly Socks_ isn't to be joked with."

"Everything in this shop is to be joked with," the monster huffed. "Besides, who'd wish to smell like old socks anyway."

"There's also _Fish Stink_ and _Rotten Eggs_!" Fred announced automatically.

"If you don't tell me what I want to hear right now," the monster screamed, "I will pour you over with all three. And **that** would certainly be good for business."

Although Fred had the antidote to their Stinking Potions, he didn't have an antidote to rabid red swamp monsters, so he decided to obey once more.

"You are my favourite sister and I love you very much," he spoke quickly.

"I'm your only sister and about to kick your ass," Ginny corrected him, grabbing him by the collar and bringing his face down to her level. "Now tell me, have you seen Harry recently?"

"No!" Fred yelped, and watched the red swamp monster storm out of the shop, rubbing his injured neck.

A moment later he shrugged and forgot the incident, since it happened rather often these days.

The door banged open again, and then shut. Something bustled between the shelves, the appeared in front of him, looking bushy and frazzled.

"Have you seen my book? It can't find it anywhere!"

"What book?" Fred made the error of asking.

"_Hogwarts, A History_, of course!" Hermione exclaimed. "I can't remember taking it out of the house, but it isn't there, so it has to be somewhere else. Have you seen it?"

And without a warning Fred was once again grabbed by the collar and yanked down violently.

"I haven't seen it here," he replied, and watched the bushy whirlwind whirl away. His neck wasn't too happy about the treatment it had got, and Fred had to agree with it himself.

"Problems, problems, problems," he muttered to himself. "Why can't people be happy these days? The war is over, the sun is shining, and we do have a discount for Special Laughter Charms. But no! They just have to come here running and yelling and yanking and throwing things at me! And I wouldn't mind if they at least purchased something, but oh no, they just come here to yell and yank, yell and yank."

"Who yells and yanks?" George asked, silently closing the door behind him.

"Our dearest sister. And our dearest bookworm."

"Well, aren't you lucky today," George said sourly. "I just spent an hour with our dearest Ministress drooling over our dearest younger brother."

"You drooled over Ronniekins?" Fred raised a brow.

"No, she did."

Fred thought for a moment.

"Luna drooled over Ronniekins?"

"Yes."

"Did she fall asleep on him or something?"

"No. But she would love to."

"She's weird," Fred decided.

"Tell me about it," George rolled his eyes.

"Okay. First, she likes Ronniekins. Second, she dreams of Ronniekins. Third, she comes to you to talk about Ronniekins."

"Fourth," George added, "she thinks Ronniekins is hot."

"Well, he might be. The sun is rather warm today."

"I don't think she meant that," he protested.

"What else could she mean?"

George pondered it for a while, and in the end had to admit that the only way anyone could think little Ronniekins hot was warmed up by the sun.

"Anyway," he said in a while, pointedly ignoring Fred's triumphant expression. "All these people coming to us with all their problems are making me..."

"Annoyed? Disturbed? Crazy?"

"Hungry," George finished, "Let's go to the Hamster."

--

"Why in Merlin's third leg did you bring me to the Hamster?" George whined.

"Merlin had a third leg?"

"Oh yes. Didn't you know?"

"But why isn't it seen in any of the pictures of him?" Fred argued.

"Because it was invisible. Duh."

"Oh. And it was your idea to come here."

"Never mind," George brushed the responsibility for their trouble away, "What is Charlie doing here in England?"

"By the look of it," Fred stared at their brother, "drinking himself under the table. Let's hope he doesn't start singing."

"Should we go and... you know..."

"Help him? Comfort him? Drag him home?" Fred offered.

"Annoy him," George finished, giving his twin a funny look. It was already the second time today Fred had failed to read his thoughts, and it was also the second time today Fred had sounded caring. Something was amiss.

Something was definitely amiss. With Fred. And with the world in general. And with the Hamster as well. Because what kind of person would name their club _The Nile Coloured Hamster_? And like that wasn't bad enough, they had named it _Hamster Eau de Nil_ instead. Perhaps it was to keep people away from this place, and by the look of it, they had indeed succeeded. No one came here these days anymore. No one but the Weasleys, and Harry, and Hermione, and Malfoy, and Moody. But Moody didn't count because he was the barkeep. And Malfoy and Harry shouldn't count either because each of them owned half of the place. So that only left Hermione and the Weasleys. Well, at least there was a lot of the latter. Oh, and then there was Luna, too. But she only came here to drool over Ronniekins, or rant to George about her drooling over Ronniekins.

"George?" Fred spoke after a while. "Do you want to save the world?"

"Not that I know of. But I do want your cranberry muffin, some dragon scales, and a crumple-horned snorkack."

"You can have the muffin, but dragon scales aren't edible, idiot."

"Neither are crumple-horned snorkacks," George commented, happily munching on Fred's muffin.

"I think," he added in a moment.

"Why do you want them then?" Fred inquired.

"I have an idea. Something new for our shop."

"That's great, George," Fred beamed, "but there's just this teeny tiny problem with it."

"What's that?"

"Crumple-horned snorkacks don't exist."

"That's too bad. I'd love to throw one at Luna so that she would stop drooling over ickle Ronniekins in front of me."

"Planning to assassinate the Ministress of Magic?" someone spoke out, proceeding to sit down at their table.

"You know, Malfoy, just because you own half of this place and are engaged to Hermione doesn't mean you can intrude yourself upon us like that," George explained, while Fred exclaimed,

"Yo, Draco!"

This joyous greeting was met with two (or three if you'd also count Charlie, who raised his head from the table and looked around with hazy expression) surprised stares directed at Fred, one of which was slightly accusing, other rather suspicious, and third (that is, if you did count Charlie) totally inebriated.

"What?" Fred demanded, getting confused himself.

"That was a rather unorthodox greeting, wasn't it?"

"It had nothing to do with any doxies, auto or not," Fred protested.

"No, I meant that it wasn't usual."

"Autodoxies?"

"No, your 'Yo, Draco' greeting."

"But what about autodoxies?"

"What about them?"

"I don't know, you brought them up."

"No, I didn't."

"Yes, you did."

"No, I didn't."

"Yes, you did," Fred insisted, then turned to Draco who was watching the exchange with wry amusement. "How is it rolling then?"

"No, I didn't," George objected. "How's what rolling?"

"Yes, you did. Life, of course."

"Fine, I suppose," Draco managed to insert a sentence of his own into the twins' conversation.

"Where does life roll?" George asked, his interest piqued.

"Down the hill, I suppose."

"But what if it reaches the lowest point?"

"Then someone must roll it up the hill again."

"Oh. The same hill?"

"What's wrong with the same hill?" Fred demanded.

"Nothing, nothing," George said quickly.

"Good," Fred nodded at him, then looked at Draco again,

"How're things going with our favourite bookworm?"

"Do things roll as well, or only life does that?" George interrupted.

"Some things roll, like balls or bottles. But others like forks or fireplaces don't."

"Fine. She threw me out of my house."

"Oh," said George, thought for a moment, and added, "Oh!"

"Does she often throw you out of your house?" Fred inquired tactfully.

"Not really. Usually just out of the room," Draco explained.

"But this time she threw you out of a window instead of a door?" George suggested.

"No, this time she threw me out of the front door and warded the place off against me."

"Wow!" said Fred and George at once.

"Let's go!" the former exclaimed, jumping to his feet.

"Sure," George agreed, and saying good-bye to Draco (or, in Fred's case, yo), they walked out of _Hamster Eau de Nil_.

"Where are we going?" George asked after a while.

"We are going to break into the Malfoy Manor," Fred explained.

"Oh, okay," George agreed, and Apparated away after his twin.

--

"Screwdriver!"

"You don't need a screwdriver to break through wards," George protested, but conjured him one anyway.

"Oh, I wouldn't say that, brother of mine. Screwdrivers are very important."

"You don't even know what a screwdriver is."

"Of course I do," Fred declared, picking up the object. "It's for catching lightning."

"And getting yourself killed," George added.

"That, or imprisoning the lightning into the screwdriver so you can have some eckeltricity."

"Does that have something to do with eclairs?"

Fred decided the question was not worthy of an answer, so he contended himself with a haughty look at his brother before turning back to the window at hand.

After they had managed to take down the first four wards, George got a bit curious.

"Not that I mind doing this, but is there any reason why we are breaking into Malfoy's house?"

"I just thought it might be fun. Isn't it?"

"Sure," George agreed. "As long as there is no one drooling about ickle Ronniekins by my side, I'm happy."

"How about ickle Ginniekins?" Fred inquired.

"What! Who's drooling over Ginny? I'll kill him!" George exclaimed.

"Hold your brotherly feelings at bay. You might frighten poor Harriekins away."

"Harriekins? Where?"

"Hey, guys," Harry said, stopping behind the twins, "what are you doing?"

"Hey, Harry," George greeted. "We are breaking into."

"Oh. Any particular reason?"

"Nah, just for fun."

"Want to join us?" Fred offered, carefully removing the fifth layer.

"Perhaps some other time. Is Hermione home?"

"I don't know. We haven't got in yet. But you can always ring the bell."

"I'll do that. Bye, guys."

"He looked a little depressed, didn't he?" George mentioned to his brother when Harry was gone.

"I told you he is pining for our favourite red swamp monster."

"And what about our favourite red swamp monster?"

"Well, she is going around, yelling and yanking people."

"And drooling over dear Harriekins?"

"That too."

For a while they worked in silence. Then suddenly George exclaimed "Done!" and after opening the window, they both climbed into the house.

"We should do something," Fred said seriously.

"Ah, don't worry, sharks don't eat people. And when it comes too close, I'll stab it with my screwdriver," George calmed his brother, removing one of his hands from the bars above the huge shark pool the room had metamorphosed into the moment their feet had touched the floor, and taking the screwdriver out of his pocket.

"That's **my** screwdriver," Fred corrected him, "and I didn't mean that. I meant that perhaps we should make people happy."

"We are not giving out the Special Laughing Charms for free!"

"Of course not! But perhaps we could... you know... push certain people towards other certain people. And things like that."

"You want to play a matchmaker?" George asked in shock.

"Or a shark trainer," Fred suggested.

George looked at the shark, then at the screwdriver, then at his brother.

"You do know that we can take our wands and magic us out of here?" he asked.

"Of course. But that would be no fun at all."

"True. So who are we going to push towards each other?"

"Harriekins and Ginniekins!" Fred supplied.

"And then there's also Hermione, and Ron, and Luna, and Charlie for us to push around."

"And Draco."

"And Draco," George agreed.

"You're in then?"

"In the shark pool? Certainly. In the pushing people around thing? You bet."

George and Fred grinned at each other. The shark grinned at both of them.


	2. Shocking Record

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 2: Shocking Record**_

George took off his socks and wrenched the water out of them, wriggling his toes at the same time to get the blood moving again. Fred had to admit now that conjured screwdrivers weren't as invincible tools as he had implied, and George reminded himself to point this detail out to his brother when he reappeared from the bathroom where he was currently drying his hair. And George would never suggest anyone who valued his life to use a screwdriver as his sole weapon against a shark (well, he conceded, he was ready to make an exception for Snape. And, at this very moment, for Fred).

An almost dry red head appeared from behind the bathroom door, followed by a naked chest covered in a painful-looking rash.

"What are you doing here?" Fred asked his brother.

"What do you think I'm doing here?" George shot back with sarcasm, indicating to his wet clothes and dripping hair.

"It wasn't my fault that we got wet," Fred defended.

"Really?"

"Really."

"Oh, I thought it was you who suggested we break into the Malfoy Manor."

"Well, it wasn't like I knew they had such enchantments on it!"

"And probably it wasn't your fault, either, that we only had a screwdriver to fight against a full-grown evil-minded shark."

"But that ended up being an illusion charm, didn't it?"

"Sure, but that didn't prevent it from scaring us to death and getting us wet! The water was no illusion!"

"Scaring us? I wasn't scared. You might have been, but I wasn't."

"Oh? You weren't? Then my ears must have deceived me because I certainly heard you screaming in horror," George asked.

"But that did break the illusion charm in the end, didn't it? So I was the one who defeated it."

"Your screaming didn't break it. It was Hermione's coming to see who had been caught that broke it. She was the one who took down the enchantment. And you would have drowned had she not levitated you out of the pool."

"But everyone knows that I'm allergic to levitation charms," Fred pouted. "Besides… have you ever seen her in such a mood? It's not like her to throw us out without a second thought."

"No," George agreed, putting on dry socks and drying his head with the towel Fred had flung his way. "Have you?"

"Yes," Fred answered.

"Really? When?"

"When she came to the shop this morning. But then she was more angry and nervous, and her eyes definitely weren't as red."

"Poor girl, she's really unhappy."

Fred nodded his assent. _Yes_, he thought, _Hermione was really unhappy when she was having a fight with Draco_.

George nodded, too. _Yes_, he thought, _Hermione was really unhappy being with Draco_.

"I'll try to do something about it," they told in unison, and then fell out laughing.

"So, what are you doing sitting here? Who's tending to the shop?" Fred asked, smearing a salve on the levitation rash on his skin.

"All right, I'll go," George grumbled with a wistful look towards the sofa and blazing fireplace, drying himself with a spell.

--

George thanked Merlin's invisible third leg for the fact that they had managed to get Hermione interested in their business; that was of course before she became interested in things like Draco and Ron. But her help had been immense, making shop-keeping not an obligation, but a pleasure — she had developed spells for them; spells that were placed on all the walls and doors and windows and floors and ceilings and fireplaces of the shop; spells that made shoplifting not only difficult, but impossible. Spells that stunned a person that tried to leave the shop without having paid the required amount of gold for their purchases without asking questions.

Ok, there were some flaws. Harry and Ginny had been struck down once when she had asked George's help in pranking him, and Harry had persuaded Fred to help in pranking her. They both had regained consciousness thirty two hours later, and vowed never to enter the shop again.

Fred and George found out they hadn't meant their vows the next morning when they woke up glued to their bedspreads with the Permanent Sticking Charm. They had had to announce an Ancient Rome Week at their shop before they managed to scrub the sheets off.

But now they knew to be careful with removing their inventions from the shop, and the spells had become really useful. They didn't even have to be at the shop when it was open, though they usually wanted to be there to make an impression on their customers.

Now, as George found his way downstairs, there was only one client in the shop, one that probably had never been there in his life, and would never again go there.

"Mr. Weasley," he acknowledged him crisply, blowing George's hope that he hadn't been noticed.

"Professor Snape," he replied, getting behind the counter. "Help yourself to whatever you want." George tried to smile, but it looked more like a menacing grin. He pushed the button they had under the counter, the one that notified the other twin that it was pranking time. He could almost sense Fred feeling the sting of the signal and sneaking onto the stairway to see who it was about.

"I'd rather you stopped that foolishness," Snape said.

"Pardon?"

"That foolishness with trying to dye my hair red and gold."

_How did he __**know**__ that?_ George wondered.

"I'm here for business," Snape continued, making George gasp again. He shook himself to regain his flare.

"May I suggest something then? For a busy professor as yourself, we have a whole selection of sweets. Swift pills, for example. Everything goes much quicker. Let yourself fly through time at double speed! Liven up your Potions classes!" George smiled. The last sentence was actually on the label of the sweets, too, only meant for students.

"I'm not here for silly joke products," Snape almost hissed, but didn't leave.

"So maybe you would like to roll down on the pre-order list for our newest invention: Treble-Double-You — do many things at the same time, or get yourself an assistant who's just as competent as you are! Pre-order fee just two Galleons and six Sickles. And get a daydream charm of your choice free." _Okay, I should have left the last part out_.

"Alright then. Put me down on the list," Snape said with a heavenly expression on his face, shocking George.

George blinked quickly, not believing the sight, and when he opened his eyes again Snape looked as menacing as always. Only the pile of gold and silver on the table remained, proving that it hadn't been a figment of his imagination. He slowly took out the parchment onto which they wrote down the orders, keeping one eye on his former professor.

Snape let him finish his writing, before speaking again.

"I actually came here for Potter."

"Harry?" George started to think it was a new world record — most times being shocked by a professor in the duration of ten minutes.

"Yes, Potter. Professor McGonagall suggested that you might know why he hasn't answered."

"Me? Know? Hasn't answered?" _Six._

"I see that your mind hasn't improved since we last met," he said.

Now that was more like the Snape he knew.

"Yes. You, know, hasn't answered," Snape continued.

"Well," George said to buy some time. What was it that Harry hadn't answered to? "What hasn't he answered to?"

"You're saying you don't know?" Snape's eyebrows were in the danger of touching his greasy hair. "I thought you shared everything."

"Erm… I'm George, not Ron, sir," George said, trying not to notice that his ears were turning red. _Seven_.

"Oh, you aren't?" Snape said in mild surprise. "A pity."

_No, it isn't,_ George wanted to say, but managed not to.

Snape stood at the counter, looking him up and down with his eyes. He seemed to be waiting for something, only George didn't know what exactly.

"I'm sorry I couldn't help you," he said finally, hoping that Snape would get the hint and leave.

He didn't.

"Can I help you with something else, professor?"

"You owe me something."

"I? Owe? What?" _Curse of being a twin,_ George scolded himself,_ only half of a brain_.

"A classic 27-minute daydream charm for grownups," he said.

_Eight_.

"Coming up right now," George panted, happy to have an excuse to turn his back to the client.

He virtually flew up the stairs as the last hem of the billowing black robes of the Potions professor had disappeared through the door. Fred was lounging on the sofa with a butterbeer, his rash almost gone, only a faint bluish green tinge left on his skin.

"You look like the Hamster," he said, dropping down in an armchair.

"Was that really Snape?"

"He took a daydream charm!"

"I got him with Standard Gryffindor."

"He knew you were doing it."

"So what? It's not like he can do anything."

"He can ask for a discount."

"On what?"

"Treble-double-you."

"He didn't!" Fred asked bemusedly.

"He did!" George answered with exaggeration.

"You didn't!" Fred said accusingly.

"I did," George replied with a blush.

"But we haven't got them, yet."

"So what? We will have in a short while."

"But we might not get them to work."

"But then I just managed to sell a classic grownup daydream charm for two Galleons and six Sickles.

"Great price."

"I know."

Silence.

"Shouldn't you be down there to make the little kids spend all their pocket money?" Fred asked.

"I'm not going there again."

"That bad, huh?"

"Yeah."

"What did he want?"

"To know why Harry has not been writing to McGonagall lately."

"Curse my corrupt mind!"

"And mine."

"What did you say?"

"That I'm not Ron."

Silence.

"You're not?" Fred asked.

"I'm not."

Silence.

"Do you think—?" Fred started.

"That Harry would prefer Minerva to Ginevra?"

"Yes."

"No."

"Me neither."

"Good."

Silence.

"So, what do you think Minerva has been writing to Harry about?"

"Something to do with the school?"

"Something to do with Voldemort?"

"Something to do with the Ministry?"

"Something to do with the Order?"

"Something to do with the Hamster?"

They both thought about it for a moment. Then Fred shook his eau-de-nil head.

"No, probably not."

"But what, then?"

"Something to do with teaching?"

"Something to do with the other teachers?"

"Something to do with herself?"

"Something to do with her— ah, never mind."

"And I curse your corrupt mind," Fred smirked.

"Hey, I wasn't thinking anything like that!"

"You were!"

"No, I wasn't! You were the one here thinking along those lines!"

"Prove it!"

"You're blushing, and it doesn't look handsome mixed with the green like that."

"Oh, alright. Maybe I was thinking about something like that."

"See, I was right!" George whooped.

They looked at each other, not mirror images now that Fred had a different tone of skin, but the expressions on their faces were identical, portraying their amusement and leisurely spirit and art of forgetting all negative experiences momentarily.

"So what else did he want?" Fred asked after a while of beaming at his twin brother.

"Besides thinking that I'm Ron, meddling with the love-affairs of the Headmistress of the best school of magic there is and the one and only Boy Who Killed, and preordering a product that would be balancing on the border of legality if we had it, only to get a daydream charm without actually purchasing it?"

"Yes, besides that."

"I don't know. Should he have had something else to come here for?"

"You think he would enter a building full of the despised Weasleys only on orders of McGonagall?"

"Yes?" George asked, then thought a little and shook his head. "No, you're right. He probably had an ulterior motive."

"And what could that be?" Fred wondered, and they both took a moment to go over the details in their minds.

"You don't think—?" George gasped.

"It would be outrageous!"

"But that would be a reason…"

"But which of them?"

"You definitely have a dirty mind, oh brother of mine," George shook his head again.

"I know. We're twins, if you haven't noticed."

Silence.

"You should go down to the shop again," Fred suggested.

"You should go start working on Treble-Double-You," George answered.

"I can't! We don't have dragon scales."

"But we have Charlie," George winked, getting up and walking towards the stairs.

"But he's drunk!"

"The easier for you to talk to him," George smiled, sliding down the railing back to the shop.

* * *


	3. The Drunk and the Sober

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 3: The Drunk and The Sober**_

"Hi, Charlie. What's up?" Fred asked conversationally, slumping down to the seat across from his rather drunk brother.

"George," he acknowledged him with a slothful wave of his arm.

"It's Fred," Fred corrected with the pretense of being deeply hurt. "I can see that you are not quite yourself at the moment, but to mistake your own brother… I'm wounded."

Charlie let out a dry chuckle, which might have been a cough as well, but since Fred had already managed to live into his role of the deeply wounded, he took it as being laughed at. Which was actually rather correct.

"You should be grateful I didn't mistake you for Moody. And I think I might have called him Luna a few times."

"Then I suppose you really are drunk," Fred decided, his plan to sound hurt and insulted already forgotten.

"That's nothing!" Charlie exclaimed, yanking his bottle towards Fred so sharply that he barely managed to duck from that stream of Firewhiskey which now coursed over his head and landed somewhere behind him. Since it wasn't followed by screams and shouts, he deduced that no one had been harmed.

"That's nothing," Charlie repeated, glaring angrily at his bottle for spilling its content to someplace else than his mouth. "Compared to the sight I saw only a few moments before."

"What did you see?" Fred inquired curiously.

"I saw…" he began, then made a dramatic pause, trying to remember what exactly he had intended to say. "I saw Ron."

"I **can** see why that would disturb you, but surely you have seen Ron before."

"Reading," Charlie finished triumphantly. "I saw Ron reading. A book."

"Where?" Fred asked with a mix of delight, horror, and incredibility.

"There," Charlie indicated with his bottle again, throwing his hand over his shoulder and being very surprised when he pulled it back and noticed the bottle gone.

Fred observed its trajectory with interest. It rose higher and higher and higher, but before hitting the ceiling and shattering into hundreds of pieces, it started to fall instead, shooting over several tables before finally meeting its doom against one.

The occupant of that table jumped up with a cry, and snatched something off the table, too late in his attempt to protect it from the glass and Firewhiskey. It seemed to be rather heavy, the object, from the way he was holding it, and he thought it was rectangular in its shape. For a moment the victim stood there like a fool, staring down at the mess in front of him, but then he slowly turned and looked around the room in search of the culprit.

Fred quickly lowered his eyes and tried to look inconspicuous. For some reason, though, it didn't work.

"Did you throw a bottle of Firewhiskey at me?" an angry voice spoke from their side, and Fred glanced up, practicing his expression of innocence this time.

"Oh, it's you, Ronniekins," he spoke in relief.

"Did you throw a bottle at me?" Ron repeated his question, not sounding one bit mollified.

"Do you really think I would do something like this?"

"Yes," Ron answered at once.

"Yes, you are probably right," Fred admitted. "But this time you are yelling at the wrong brother."

Ron glared at him for another moment, then turned to glare at Charlie instead, who greeted him with a wave and "Hi, Ginny."

"He's drunk," Fred explained the very obvious.

Ron glared at his very obviously very drunk brother a moment longer, then gave up with a long sigh.

"I'll leave you two alone then," he said at last, and did exactly that, going back to his old table and clearing up the mess with his wand.

Fred observed him for a while, then shrugged and turned back to his other brother. The drunk one.

"Anyway, Charlie, there's something I'd like to ask you," he waited until the unfocused gaze of his brother's eyes was more of less directed his way.

"A tiny favour, you might call it."

"No," Charlie said at once.

"You don't even know what I am asking!" Fred protested.

"And that's the way I want to keep it."

"It's not illegal," Fred justified, thinking that there was nothing illegal about dragon-scales whatsoever. Probably.

"And it will not turn me into anything?" Charlie inquired, proving that he was easier to persuade when drunk.

"No, it will not change anything about you," Fred insisted.

"And you will not try to test it on me when it gets ready?"

"No, of course not," he replied, thinking that they already had a test subject, other than themselves – Snape.

"All right then," Charlie agreed.

"You'll do it?" Fred smiled enthusiastically.

"I'll let you tell me what it is."

"Oh, nothing much, brother of mine, nothing much," Fred spoke casually. "Just a few dragon-scales."

Charlie frowned. Or at least tried to.

"What do you need dragon-scales for? They are no good for anything," he paused and considered his words. "Well, they are rather useful for dragons, but not in potions or anything like that."

"Then you don't mind giving them to me?" Fred asked hopefully.

"No, not at all. We've got tons of them in the reserve. Take as much as you can carry."

"Great," Fred whooped.

"Let's go now," he suggested in a moment, thinking that Charlie might not be quite that generous once he sobered up again.

Charlie stared at him for a while, then at his empty bottle, coming to a decision.

"Sure, let's go," he finally agreed. "Let me take you to Hamster."

"But we already are in the Hamster," Fred couldn't but mention, looking around to make sure of it just in case the inn had decided to go for a walk.

"Not this Hamster," Charlie grinned at him, slowly struggling to his feet, and after a moment of swaying this way and that, managing to gain some kind of a balance.

"Oh?" Fred inquired, standing up as well. "Not Hamster Eau de Nil?"

"She actually did get her name after this place," Charlie informed him. "Only at that time we thought that eau de nil was a shade of silvery blue."

Fred nodded, and couldn't quite blame them, since his first thought about eau de nil had been somewhere around fiery red, but right now there was something else piquing his attention. But as soon as he started to consider how brilliant of an idea it was for an utterly inebriated person to Apparate, a heavy hand had landed on his shoulder, and the next second they were gone.

--

By the magnificent mountainous landscape and piles of colourful scales glittering in the sun, Fred concluded they had arrived safely at the famous Gura Zlatna Dragon Reserve. At least he had arrived safely as all his limbs and body parts seemed still intact and in their right places. He turned around to see if Charlie was fine, too, but instead of his brother, or at least parts of his brother, he found himself face to face with the short snout of a Short-Snout. The dragon was in deep sleep and that was the only reason why Fred was given the opportunity to panic, which he gladly took.

So much for a safe landing.

"Charlie," he whispered in terror. "There's a dragon in front of us."

"Isn't she marvellous!" Charlie's voice boomed out, as loud as it got.

"Shush!" Fred exclaimed silently. "You'll wake it up."

"She is a she, not it," Charlie explained. "And I doubt she will wake up today."

"Just in case, though, perhaps we should get away," Fred tried his best not to scream, making a mental note to stay clear of a drunk Charlie in the future.

"No worries, little bro," Charlie didn't seemed to have noticed the danger, even though it was damn huge, snoring loudly, and right in front of them.

"That's why we have this dragon-proof glass here," he explained, knocking against the glass that was indeed there.

Fred stared at it for a moment, then turned back to his brother, and from there to the slumbering beast.

"Shouldn't the glass be between us and the dragon?" he voiced his concerns. "Not us being between the glass and the dragon?"

"Hmm, you're right," Charlie agreed after a momentary thought. "It should be."

But as he took no action to correct this little error, Fred suddenly realized he was able to Apparate as well, and the next second they were both standing on the right side of the dragon-proof glass.

At least Charlie was standing, and rather steadily, while Fred decided that after such an experience he really needed to sit down.

"How about those scales then?" Charlie asked after a while.

"You tried to kill me!" Fred accused, still whispering.

"I had the situation under my control the whole time," he remarked casually.

"No, you didn't! There was a dragon in front of us, and you were drunk. Really, they should fire you for that."

Charlie chuckled, and this time it was really a laugh, and not a cough.

"You really think I would Apparate us both this far while being drunk?" he inquired with a smirk.

"Well, you did!" Fred justified, then frowned. "Wait a second. Are you telling me that you are not drunk?"

"Do I look like drunk?" he questioned, pulling his brother up from the ground. Fred had to admit that indeed he didn't.

"You… you tricked me?" he asked incredulously after regaining his ability of speech.

"And that coming from someone whose motto is to trick anyone anywhere anytime."

"I thought your motto was never to trick a Weasley twin for they will get it back on you ten times worse?" Fred narrowed his eyes.

"No, not mine," Charlie beaming. "You must have confused me with someone else."

"Yes, probably," Fred replied darkly, plans of revenge springing to life in his mind.

"How about this," Charlie suggested. "You will be nice and humble and will not use every second of your day to plan revenge upon your nice big brother and in return he will give you all the dragon-scales you want?"

"I'm sure Bill would appreciate you being all nice and humble to him. But why would you need any scales from him if you already have so much yourself?" Fred was confused.

His brother only rolled his eyes at that, not bothering to explain. Perhaps it had been a bit foolish on his part to think one of the twins capable of being nice and humble.

"Let's go then," he said instead. "Let's get you the scales."

But instead of setting off right away like Fred, he lingered back for a second, looking caringly at the sleeping dragon and heaving a long sigh.

"Sad to leave your girlfriend behind?" Fred teased, once his brother had caught up with him.

"It's not like there's someone else," Charlie muttered under his breath, but before Fred managed to make a sympathetic face, they had reached a great pile of colourful dragon-scales, and suddenly he had no mind or eyes for anything else.

--

The moment George got a glimpse of black hair he dived under the counter, afraid that Snape might have returned. Those were the scariest fifteen seconds of his life, crouching down in an uncomfortable position, too terrified to move or even breathe, hearing the footsteps coming closer and closer and closer.

And closer and closer and closer… the rustle of cloth, the breathing, someone moving **around** the counter!

"George, who are you hiding from?"

"Hiding?" he questioned, jumping up from the floor with a wide grin. "I'm not hiding! I just dropped something."

"And did you find it?" Harry inquired, noticing that both of George's hands were empty.

"No, I didn't," he admitted. "I think it probably scurried away."

"Oh," Harry replied, completely buying that explanation, and for a moment wondering whether he wanted to know what it had been, then deciding that in this case, ignorance was definitely a bliss, and turned his gaze to survey the room instead, in search of something small, and probably furry, and most definitely ferocious.

"By the way," George's grin turned a bit evil, "your sweetheart dropped in just today."

"There's nothing between me and Ginny," Harry said quickly, with a blush and backwards step, afraid of what the conversation might turn into.

"Oh, I know," George waved casually, "and I wasn't really talking about Ginny. I meant Snape. Now, how long have the two of you been dating already? And why have you never told me anything? I thought we were friends."

The look on Harry's face was most amusing.

* * *

**End Note: **You should review. If only to bug Larix decidua about writing the next chapter. If she doesn't do it soon, and believe me when I say she has had enough time to do it, we are going to run out of pre-written chapters. Which is bad.


	4. Defence

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 4: Defence**_

George had ample time to think about his words as Harry stood in front of him as if he had been hit by a mighty strong _Confundus_ charm — his mouth was hanging open, he wasn't blinking his eyes, he didn't even seem to be breathing. He didn't look one bit charming, and George couldn't but wonder how Ginny found Harry so irresistible.

His mind already moving in that direction, he remembered how he and Fred had decided to help them get together, and now he realised that his previous words probably didn't help in that respect in any way. So he decided to do his best to lessen the harm.

"So, how can I help you?" he finally said, not managing to come up with anything better.

Harry didn't move for another twenty seconds or so, then shook himself, looked around, and asked, "What?"

"I asked whether I could help you anyhow," George repeated, thinking to himself that they considered Ron slow.

"Oh, well, oh, yes, I mean," Harry said slowly, then fumbled in his pockets for a while, found some parchment, took it out, looked at it, put it back in there, and asked, "Do you know where Ron is?"

"No," George said. "He might be at the Hamster, though."

"Why do you think that?"

"Recently he has developed a close relationship with—"

"—Moody?" Harry asked, his eyebrows raised so high that his scar got wrinkled.

"I was about to suggest firewhiskey, but that's a possible solution, too," George answered thoughtfully.

"Then, erm, I suppose his opinion won't help me either way," Harry wondered to himself.

"Can I help you?" George pressed on. "We have this wonderful line of AdviSpins — ask the question, spin it, and never do what it lands on! And the boards come in three varieties: romance, school, and parties."

Harry glanced at the _Romance_ board that George was waving in front of him, and saw different suggestions there, ranging from 'Cut off all your hair' to 'Get married'.

"How much is it?" he asked distractedly, his hand moving towards his money bag.

"For you just three Sickles," George replied, taking the required money that Harry pushed over to him in a faraway manner.

Harry, at the same time, had taken the _Romance_ board and was studying it closely.

"Hey!" he shouted indignantly. "It's not fair!"

"What's not fair?" George asked, securing the three Sickles in the register.

"There's no possible answer to my question here!"

"Then your question must be wrong," George said.

"But I don't need it, then!"

"Too bad," George smirked, wondering how it was possible that he had switched from 'concerned friend' mode to 'stingy shopkeeper' mode that quickly. It most certainly didn't go with his current policy of getting Harry and Ginny to love each other without getting them to hate him in the process.

"But I agree to try to answer your question myself, if it is any help," he said.

"Really?" Harry asked, the board dropping to the floor, and his eyes round in hope.

"Sure," George smiled. "Fire away!"

"See, I got this letter…" Harry started.

"From McGonagall?" George gasped.

"How did you know?" Harry asked.

"Ah, no matter, no matter," George quickly smoothed, continuing, "and now you are wondering how to say no to her?"

"Well, no! I mean… I don't know. Maybe I should accept," Harry shrugged. "I mean… I'd like to accept, but then Ginny…"

George blanched. Harry would like to accept. He would like to accept. He didn't know how to answer to Minerva, but he'd like to accept.

George's brain wasn't capable of processing anything else.

"I don't even know how Ginny regards me, but then I'd be so far away from her all the time and…" Harry continued.

"What?!" George finally regained his composure. "You'd like to accept?"

"Of course! That's what I've wanted all along. Or at least since after Voldemort's death. Before I had other things to think about, but now…"

"No, but…" George's brain was working on double speed at least. "What about your age?" he finally asked, coming to a possible way to make Harry see reason.

"I thought about that myself, too, but she wouldn't have offered it to me if she wasn't convinced I'm old enough. Besides," he added with a small smile, "it's not like I don't have enough experience."

George blanched again, and gulped nervously.

"You mean…" he started slowly.

"Yeah, I think I did quite a good job with most of the DA. And then when chasing Voldemort with Ron and Hermione and Malfoy and Snape…"

"With Snape!" George shouted, horrified. "You can't have… I don't believe it! I refuse to believe it!" He was ranting silently now.

"What? You certainly knew that Snape was there with us," Harry said, wondering why George looked as if he had just been forced to drink Bubotuber Pus. "It can't be such a surprise for you."

"Knew… surprise… with everyone… almost everyone… Dear Merlin! Fred!!" he screamed, attacking the button under the counter fiercely to get Fred to join him instantly from wherever he might be at the moment (probably still upstairs drinking butterbeer and knowing nothing about the quite unconventional approach to… you know… that the best friend of their brother and the almost decided-upon future husband of their only sister had).

"Oh yeah," Harry sighed, "Awful times those were. No one could be without doing it all the time…"

"I could!" George quickly piped in, now definitely as green in his face as Fred had been earlier.

"Well, directly, yes, but you and Fred did your own share with all this," Harry swiped his hand to indicate to the whole shop, "and then the back room, too, of course," he added with a small sly smile.

George felt his hand, which had all this time been pressing the button every few seconds, drop from it, and tears were about to start welling up in his eyes.

"My back room! What did you do in my back room! My back room is not for things like this…"

Harry looked at the eighth wonder of the world with round eyes. He would have never thought that he'd be the sole witness to the great Whimpering Weasley Twin. It looked quite unnerving to see him shivering there, hugging himself, ranting.

"Erm… George?" he asked, putting his hand on the Weasley's shoulder carefully.

George jumped, looked at him, shouted, "NO!" and took a step back.

"George?"

"I mean… you! And everyone!"

"What are you talking about?" Harry asked, taking a step towards George, at which the other took another quick backwards step.

"You with Ron, and Hermione, and Malfoy, and Snape, and the whole DA…"

"But those were such times," Harry said consolingly, cornering George between the counter and a shelf. "But now, after Voldemort…"

"You… with Voldemort, too?" George asked, his voice barely louder than breathing.

Harry quickly looked around the shop, and when he saw that he was the sole customer there at the moment, decided to tell George the truth.

"Well, in all honesty," he started, but then quickly added, "but you must promise not to tell anyone about that!"

"Mm-hmm," George nodded quickly, his eyes wet.

"Actually, it was Snape," Harry said in a whisper.

"Voldemort was Snape?" George asked, so surprised that he even almost forgot to whimper.

"No! Snape did it, though everyone now thinks it was me," Harry said.

"Snape? And Hermione, and Ron, and the DA…"

"What?" Harry asked, now completely puzzled.

"What?" George replied just as bewilderedly.

"What are you talking about?" Harry asked again.

"What are _you_ talking about?" George asked in his turn.

"Erm… That it was Snape who killed Voldemort, actually," Harry blushed a bit.

"Oh," George said, calming down a bit. "But it was still you, then, with Draco, and Hermione, and Ron, and the rest of the DA, and, dear Merlin, with McGonagall now…" he was sinking back to the ranting and whimpering self he had just discovered he had.

"What are you talking about?" Harry asked, crooking his eyebrow now.

"What are _you_ talking about?" George said again.

"About whether I should or should not accept Minerva's offer," Harry said.

"Offer to…" George prompted him to continue, still on the verge of crying.

"Offer to teach Defence against the Dark Arts, of course," Harry said. "What did you think, then?"

"Nothing." George quickly said.

"No, really?" Harry said sardonically.

"Nothing, nothing at all," George added, trying to pull himself together quickly.

"As you say," Harry said, smiling again. "But what should I do, then? Should I accept?"

"No," was the swift and definite answer George gave him.

"Why not?" Harry asked, not having expected such a quick and negative reply.

"Because, well, Ginny is not there," he said, adding in his mind, _and it's better safe than sorry; McGonagall… and Snape, too…_

"Ah, you're probably right," Harry said with a sigh. "I'll go send her an owl, then."

"You can go write at our office, if you want," George offered, just to make sure that Harry wouldn't have time to change his mind before declining the offer, and in that way have himself closed up with dirty-minded professors who only thought about doing dirty things with other professors.

Harry nodded gratefully and walked towards the closed door at the back wall of the shop. He was already almost at the door when something clicked in George's head.

"What! Snape killed Voldemort?" he almost shouted, his eyes bulging out in disbelief.

--

Fred felt the small stinging on his forearm as if a mosquito had bitten him, and he recognised it instantly — George was calling for help. But a quick glance around him over the paddocks and little hills covered in colourful dragon scales helped him decide that George could take care of himself for a little while, and he'd better just hurry up with gathering the scales, trying not to pay any attention to the almost incessant stinging in his hand which made him quiver as if a low voltage electric charge was being earthed through him.

Finally, his pockets full, and the two huge sacks that Charlie had conjured for him, too, he went back to his brother.

"Are you finished?" Charlie asked.

"Yeah," Fred eyed the full sacks with obvious love, still jumping every time the button in their shop was pushed. "Now take me back before George kills me."

Charlie smiled protectively at his brother and took hold of his arm. He was rather happy himself that he had passed the International Apparition test, but as much as he would have liked all his family to be able to visit him at all times, it was just too much to hope that Ron, who had even trouble with small distances and familiar places, and the twins who couldn't spend more time than about eighteen minutes learning something, could ever get the hang of it. So he Apparated them both back to the Hamster, trying not to pay any attention to the way Fred's hand was yanking.

Fred landed sprawled over one of his bags, and before he could get up to start reprimanding Charlie, his brother was gone. With much more satisfaction, though, he discovered that so was the stinging in his hand — it seemed that George had managed to take care of his problems.

He sent a quick look around the barroom of the Hamster, and noticed Ron still staring at a book at the far end, and Ginny staring at a letter at the complete other side of the room. Not wanting to go back to George so soon after he had been in trouble, Fred made his way towards his sister instead.

"Hiya!" he said, plopping down in a chair, a sack of scales in either hand.

"Hey, Fred," Ginny said, not raising her eyes from the letter.

"How did you know it was me? I could just as easily be Snape," Fred said.

"Very funny," Ginny answered, still not looking at him. "Do you know where Hermione is?"

"Locked herself up in the Manor and mighty angry, don't go in there," Fred suggested with an involuntary shudder.

"Oh," Ginny said, thought a moment, then asked, "But Harry?"

Fred strained his memory for a second. "Last time I saw him, he was going to the Manor, too," he finally said, a strange and completely unwelcome connection forming in his corrupt mind, something to give a fairly good reason why Hermione had been as angry when they had broken into the house and demanded her attention.

"But by now he could be anywhere," he quickly added, half to get the look of devastation off the face of his beloved sister, half to ensure himself that there was nothing but friendship between Harry and Hermione. "He could even be at the WWW driving George mad, though that's not very probable."

"Can you give me some advice?" Ginny suddenly asked, only now turning her eyes to Fred.

"Sure," Fred said, smiling.

"Some sound advice," Ginny added. "Some advice that I can really count on being the sensible way of action."

"I'll try," Fred said, his smile sinking away from his face.

"McGonagall offers me the post of the Defence teacher because Harry, who would have been her first choice, hasn't accepted it. Should I take it?"

"Hell, yeah!" Fred said almost instantly.

"But what if Harry's owl has just got lost and he wants to accept it?"

"Hedwig never gets lost, you know that. Besides, just make sure your owl doesn't get lost, then."

Ginny still didn't look quite convinced.

"If you accept you can show Harry that you can take care of yourself and that you're a grown-up woman and that he better get a move on before he loses you," Fred hazarded a guess, and the way Ginny raised her eyes showed him that he wasn't very wide off the mark.

"You really think that?" Ginny asked hopefully.

"Sure," Fred said. "Write your reply now," he said, waving to Moody to bring some parchment and ink.

When Fred left the Hamster a moment later, a sack of dragon scales in each of his hands, whistling merrily, he smiled up at the setting sun as if thanking it for the wonderful day it had been.

* * *

**Reviews would be awfully nice and very much appreciated. :)**


	5. Tomato Boy and Ketchup Girl

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 5: Tomato Boy and Ketchup Girl**_

Fred had barely managed to step into their shop when someone grabbed him roughly by the arm, pulled him inside, relieved him of the burden of his two bags full of dragon-scales ("I'm being robbed!" he thought, "but they don't know I have more in my pockets. Haa!"), pushed him back out, and slammed the door shut. Only then did he get the opportunity to glance at the face of his robber.

"I'm sorry I couldn't come but if you kill me now you have to make the Treble- Double-You all by yourself. And watch the shop at the same time," he quickly defended himself, noticing the slightly maniacal gleam in his brother's eyes that bore no good.

"Shut up, Fred," George replied, grabbing his arm and starting to pull it yet again.

"Where are we going?" Fred inquired, a row of desolate places flashing through his mind.

"To the Hamster," George declared. "I need a drink."

"But I just came from there," Fred whined, not in the mood to see another brother of his faking to be drunk so that he could throw a bottle at him or something like that. "Not that I was there the whole time. I met Charlie in the Hamster, and he took me to Hamster, and later brought me back to the Hamster. And I need to get back on him for that."

"I really need that drink," George mumbled as nothing seemed to make sense anymore.

--

Once they had made it into the Hamster, found one empty table out of many - it was times like this that Fred wondered whether someone had cast some Repelling Charms on the inn to keep people away because whenever he visited this place, which was really often, the only ones there would be close friends or family. Or perhaps there was simply something in the air that scared the people away. Moody, for example – ordered themselves a bottle of Firewhiskey, and drained the first glass, George started to feel like himself again.

He grinned at his brother, pretty happy that now he knew something Fred didn't, and even though he was going to tell him (because when Harry had made him promise not to speak about it to anyone, he clearly hadn't counted Fred), he was going to start with hinting, and hopefully his twin would get the very same idea he had got in the beginning. Surely he would for his dirty mind.

But just as George had rearranged his expression into one of resigned horror, Fred saw something he considered worth to mention.

"Oh, there's Ron talking to the Minister of Magic."

"Is she drooling over him again?" George asked, his fake horror turning into real one.

"I can't see," Fred stretched his neck, "and I can't hear either. Let's get closer."

"No!" George exclaimed to his twin's withdrawing form, as Fred's curiosity seemed to be too big to keep him thinking straight.

Pouring himself another glass, he pondered smugly over the advantages of remaining sane and stable and not poking his nose into other people's business, when he suddenly realized what exactly he was thinking about, jumped to his feet, and crept across the room.

"You are a tomato," the Minister of Magic was currently saying, and the twins couldn't help but agree with her, since Ron had indeed turned crimson and was spluttering about something.

"At first sight you might look squashy," she continued, oblivious to both her audience and the look of surprise and anger on her tomato boy's face, "and they are quite right. Yet there are so many uses for you, from throwing at other people, even though that isn't too nice, to making ketchup."

Fred had to clap a hand to his mouth to suppress his snort, while George thought that this was probably worth having to listen to her drool about him for the next three hours. Or perhaps not – but surely he would manage to slip away and let his twin suffer instead.

"What… What do you want?" Ron croaked at last.

"I thought that it was time to make ketchup out of you," Luna gave him a dreamy smile. "Do you want to go and make some ketchup together?"

Fred brought his other hand to his mouth as well, seeing the look on Ron's face at that, which was by now a brilliant tomato-red, with his mouth wide open, and eyes bulging out from the skull. He wasn't looking his best, that was sure, but the enamored look on her face never wavered as she waited for his answer.

To the credit of their little brother, he didn't start yelling and insulting and getting himself fired because, after all, Luna **was** the Minister of Magic and his highest superior at work.

Instead he opened and closed his mouth a few times, looking more like a fish than a tomato, let out a low guttural sound, and dashed towards the door.

"That went rather well," Luna said after a moment of silence, gracing Fred, who was standing closer to her, with a beaming smile. "Don't you agree?"

"Sure," he winked at her. "He must be crazy about you – never seen his face quite that red."

"You think so?" her smile widened.

"Of course," Fred nodded.

He barely noticed her smile grow even more, when she suddenly threw her arms around him; yet before he got a chance to react, she had already pulled away, spoken a hurried good-bye, and ran out of the door as well, in hot pursuit of the subject of her affection.

George heaved a sigh of relief. Now that she was gone he wouldn't need to worry about having to listen to her ranting and moaning, and when she finally realized that she had been given false hope, the one to get the blame would be Fred, and not him.

While George was having these wonderful thoughts, his brother had moved a bit closer to the table and was now examining the large rectangular object Ron had left behind in his hurry.

"It's a book!" he exclaimed after thorough investigation, which involved gazing at the object from every possible angle, lifting it up, and dropping it back to the table.

"What?" George inquired, waking from his reverie.

"It's a book," Fred repeated. "Ron had a book with him. You know, I'm starting to think that Charlie might have been serious when he said he had seen him reading."

"Ron? Reading? No way!"

"You're probably right," Fred agreed. "Unless it's something about Quidditch."

The book didn't look like it was about Quidditch. It didn't have the aura of some light reading, and as Fred insisted, not the weight of one either.

"You know, we could open it," George suggested, "or simply read its title."

Now that this had been said, Fred did notice a string of golden letters on its cover, something he had missed before.

"_Hogwarts, A History,_" he read out at last. "Ewww!"

"I think our little brother desperately needs our help," George spoke solemnly.

"You're right," Fred agreed. "We can't let him turn into Percy."

"Two Percys," his brother almost choked at the idea, "are two Percys too many. We have to destroy this book before it destroys our brother."

"Wait."

"Two Percys don't wait!" George exclaimed, and grabbed the book, wavering a bit under its weight.

"It's not that," Fred explained. "It's just that Hermione did a lot of yelling and yanking to me this morning because she lost her _Hogwarts, A History_."

"So?" George shrugged. "You survived that, didn't you?"

"Well, don't you think there might be a connection? Hermione lost her book, and suddenly we find our very own brother carrying that same book?"

The twins took a moment to think about it, then let out exclamations of surprise and turned to face each other.

"He didn't?"

"He did."

"Our brother!"

"I know."

"Our baby brother!"

"Yes."

"That's," Fred began, then paused to figure out what exactly it was, "interesting."

George chuckled.

"We said we help them, remember?"

"We did?"

"Yes."

"Oh yes, I might recall something about pushing and pulling and yanking and general sneaking around and messing with other people's lives," Fred grinned.

"Still, our baby brother," he added after a moment, thinking, _Poor Ronnikiens, he's so obsessed with Hermione that he even stole her book. We must help him get over her before he decides to read it simply because she has._

"I know," George nodded and thought, _Poor Ronnikiens, he's so obsessed with Hermione that upon hearing about her lost book, he went out and bought her a new one. We must help him get her before he decides to read it in order to impress her._

"He's not going to achieve anything by sulking over a book," Fred offered.

"True," George admitted, giving the book an angry glare, part for trying to corrupt his baby brother, part for making his arms hurt. He put it back to the table, and took a seat, _Accio_'ing their bottle and glasses.

"So, how was your day, oh brother of mine?" Fred inquired after a while. "Did you have to sting me a thousand times?"

"Yes, I did," George replied, and proceeded to tell him the story, the same way he had experienced it, and to his great pleasure, Fred managed to turn rather eau de nil in the face once again, and spluttered and choked on his Firewhiskey.

After the truth had been finally revealed, George had taken a good ten-minute pause to laugh at his twin, and in order to stop him Fred had been stupid enough to relate his own story concerning Charlie and Hamster, giving George a chance to laugh at him for another ten minutes. He scowled and moped a bit, but after another drink or two, joined in the laughter, since it was a much better thing to do than moping.

"Should I feel sorry for Charlie?" George inquired at last.

"When did you get yourself a conscience?" Fred raised a brow, then another, and then wriggled them both a bit for good measure. "Besides, he deserves it."

"And am I privy to your ingenious plan?"

Fred assumed an ominous look, and unlike the innocent one, actually managed to pull it off.

"I'm going to set him up on a date," he spoke solemnly.

George pondered it for a while, then cocked his head to the right and pondered it again.

"So it's your revenge to make him sickeningly happy?" It might have even had a point. There. Somewhere. Somewhere deep, deep down. Very deep. In abyssopelagic zone.

"I'll set him up with the most unsuitable annoying unbearable person in the world," Fred grinned devilishly.

"Hamster?" George gasped.

"Erm… I was thinking human," Fred confessed.

"Snape?"

"And female."

"Who knows what else Snape might be hiding."

"In that case," Fred declared, gulping down his Firewhiskey and forcing his mind not to go _there_, "I hope we will never find out about it."

"Then who?" George asked, still thinking that setting Charlie up with Snape would be a good revenge. For both. And perhaps that would stop the latter from visiting their shop again. Of course, there was a chance of things going very wrong, and the last thing he wanted was to have Snape as his brother-in-law. Urgh, very bad thought.

"I know just the right witch," Fred continued grinning at him, and after a moment George got it.

"That's brilliant!" he exclaimed.

"It was my idea," Fred boasted.

"True, but it was still brilliant."

_We'll set Charlie up with Luna, _George was thinking, _That way she will stop drooling after Ron, gets herself a Weasley, and Charlie has to put up with her. That's perfect._

_Charlie will never know what hit him, _Fred grinned like an idiot now, _And when he realizes it's McGonagall, it will be too late. Must remember to take some photos._

"Damn, I'm good," he muttered under his breath.

"And I'm a Crumple-horned Snorcack," George snorted.

"So that's what they look like!" Fred exclaimed, gazing at him with inebriated contemplation.

"Does this mean you are going to throw yourself at Luna?" he frowned after a second, thinking it might ruin his plans of getting her together with their baby brother. Of course, one Weasley for another wasn't that bad a deal.

"At least I managed to talk Harry out of accepting the DADA post and going far, far away from Ginny to dirty-minded Professors," George announced proudly after a moment of silence.

Fred pondered that new piece of knowledge.

"So it's a bad thing I convinced Ginny into accepting that DADA post and going far, far away from Harry to dirty-minded Professors?"

Five minutes and two glasses of Firewhiskey later, both Fred and George were on their feet and swaying about.

"You go and intercept Ginny's owl before it gets to McGonagall, I'll see if Harry has already dispatched his message, and if he has… I'll figure out something," George, who had spent more time laughing and less drinking, gave the orders, and Apparated away.

Fred swayed a while longer and glared sourly at the empty bottle on their table.

"Intercept the owl? How the hell I'm going to do that?"

After a moment, though, an idea struck him.

"Perhaps I could borrow Hamster…"


	6. A Usual Morning of an Unfortunate Twin

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 6: A Usual Morning of an Unfortunate Twin**_

"Get off," Fred shushed at the something moist that was tickling his neck, and groaned when he understood that the other something that was aching horribly and making him want to hide under a soft blanket for the rest of the millennium was actually his head. Slowly but surely some hazy recollection of the previous day made its way into his throbbing brain, and with a jolt of surprise he understood that his searching hand had not come upon a soft blanket to hide under. Instead it had collided with a trunk of a tree, and rather painfully.

Fred opened his eyes, gave the piercingly painful sun an angry crooked glance, and then blew on his hurting hand. As far as he could see he was down on the ground, surrounded by apple trees, and further away, receiving a full attack from the sharp needles of the over-enthusiastic sun, he could see the oddly shaped figure of his childhood home. An old shaggy owl was staring down at him with reprimanding eyes from the lowest branch of the nearest tree.

"Errol!" he greeted the owl, held out his unsteady arm, and waited for the bird to fly to him. The owl took off, and after a moment grabbed at his arm with its talons, hooted in horror, and swung onto the ground from the inertia of its speed.

"Pathetic," Fred commented as he slowly bowed down to extract the roll of parchment from the beak of the unconscious bird (and then he cursed because bowing was in no way the right thing to do with such a headache), and slipped it into his pocket, which was already bulging with dragon scales, without reading.

He gave a considering look to the Burrow, again, but not remembering why he was near it in the first place, and not wanting to torture his already tortured-feeling brain any more than necessary, he scooped up the still lifeless family owl, and Apparated onto his bed.

--

"G'day, Freddy," a cheerful voice shouted way too loudly. "I see you've gotten yourself a new teddy-bear."

"George," Fred groaned, the hidden meaning of shut-up-and-get-out-of-the-room-and-leave-me-alone painfully obvious behind it.

"I see you've got the owl. Good job! I knew I could trust you with that! So it's no matter that I couldn't get to Harry in time," George chirped.

"Owl?" Fred's muffled voice asked from under the pillow that he was using for trying to suffocate himself. "What owl? Where owl? Why owl?"

"The owl you're… erm… sleeping with," George quickly supplied with only minimal hesitation.

"Oh, the owl, yes. The note…" Fred sleepily tried to ignore the pulsating pain in his head for long enough to remember where he had put the letter, then sluggishly searched his pockets and threw the crumpled piece of parchment and several colourful dragon scales towards George. "Now leave'm'lone."

George took the parchment and turned to leave. He unfolded it and cast a quick look at it, then whipped around.

"Fred, can I ask you a question?" he said seriously.

"Hmmpf," came Fred's voice from under the pillows, and George took this as meaning "Yes, of course, dear brother, ask away."

"Are you sure this is the right owl you intercepted?" George asked.

"Hmmpf," replied Fred from between the blankets, and George took this as meaning, "Well, no, you are the more intelligent twin of the two of us, but I did the best I could."

"And my superior intelligence confirms that this can in no way be the letter Ginny sent to McGonagall," George said, half with pride of his wisdom, half with disappointment at the failure of the task he had given to Fred.

"Hmph," Fred said, the meaning of which was (in George's opinion), "Oh, please, my magnificent brother, enlighten me, the foolish one, what are the reasons for that!"

"It's addressed to us," George said, "an invitation to dinner from mum. She says it's a farewell dinner for Ginny who's starting on a new job which takes her away from home."

Fred only answered with a snore, snuggling closer to Errol.

"Are you listening to me?" George almost shouted.

Fred didn't answer, and neither did Errol.

"Of course, leave all the difficult tasks to me! It's always me who has to do everything!" And he stomped away, shutting the door with a bang.

--

The bar, Hamster Eau de Nil, was definitely jinxed. It was the only place in the world where you could always count on not finding the person you were searching for. The case was the same when George entered it this merry morning, determination on every single feature of his.

"Where's Moody?" he finally asked the empty barroom at large when he had searched every nook and cranny there was.

As it was expected, no one answered.

"I need Moody. Where is he?" George asked again, as if there were dozens of people around him staring at him with hazy eyes (as it would have been in any other bar in both Muggle and Magical world) and just trying to keep this valuable piece of information from him.

But there was still no reply.

"I need him to give me some tips on fighting evil, namely the evil that has lately captured all the people I know. So tell me where's Moody!" he demanded, hitting on the bar with his fist so hard that he barely managed to suppress the yelp of pain.

But, again, nobody told him where Moody was.

"What are you doing here?" a politely amused voice asked from behind George instead.

"Where's Moody?" George replied, spinning around and only then seeing who he was talking to. "Hey Harry," he paled, edging away from him.

"Moody's not here yet. The Hamster doesn't open for another two hours," Harry said, moving behind the bar, taking a butterbeer, and flipping through the files of last week's sales. "Besides, you should drink less. I see that the last nineteen times you've been here you've had firewhiskey. And your mother would clearly not be happy if you came to the dinner tonight being drunk."

George gulped and nodded, looking at Harry resume the leafing of the cash-account. He started edging towards the door slowly, hoping that Harry would not notice his leaving and forget his being there in the first place.

"Oh, I wanted to ask you, do you know what new job Ginny is getting? She hasn't mentioned anything to me." Harry's voice was reverberating with pain and disappointment, and the same feelings reflected in his eyes when he raised his glance to look at George, his hands still leafing the heavy parchment report.

"Erm…" the twin, caught in his act of silent retreating, replied. "No?" he tried, painting the look of innocence that always seemed to betray him on his face.

"So she's told you," Harry said with devastation. "She's told everyone but me. I'd have thought she'd at least talk to me as a friend, but no." He looked straight into George's eyes as if waiting for him to say something.

"What?" the redhead asked after some half a minute of silent staring, confused and frightened.

"Tell me!" Harry demanded.

"What?" George asked again.

"What job is she getting? Where is she going to work?" Harry's eyes were now blazing with such passion that George was forced to look down.

"Hogwarts," he mumbled so silently that even if Harry had had three pairs of Extendable Ears crawling down George's throat he wouldn't have been able to hear it.

"Pardon?" Harry asked.

"Hogwarts," George coughed out, growing so pale that even his freckles seemed to lose their power.

The thick silence indicated that Harry had stopped looking at the figures of loss the bar was yielding, and had instead focused all his attention on George. The lone twin took another backwards step, collided with a chair, and fell down sitting in it with quite a racket.

"Did I hear correctly?" Harry asked silently, the volume of his voice rising with every said word. "Hogwarts? As in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry? As in Hogwarts School Where I Was Not To Go So I Could Be Closer To Ginny?"

George didn't know what else to do than whimper. So he whimpered. And then he tried his puppy-dog eyes on Harry.

But it didn't work because Harry was far from through with his tirade. "As in Hogwarts School That Has The Post Of Defence Teacher Open Which They Offered To Me And Which You Insisted I Turn Down So That Your Own Sister Could Get The Spot?"

Harry was now towering over George so menacingly that he felt he would have to turn to the extreme methods.

"I'm not George, I'm Fred," he squeaked, trying to melt into one with the hard wooden chair he was sitting on.

Harry laughed half cruelly, half sadly, and drew his wand, but before he could do any spell, the bang of the front door announced someone coming, and he froze in his position.

"Oh, you're already here," the familiar voice of Draco drawled from the entrance, but then switched to the different, sharper tone. "What's going on? What's George doing here?"

"See, even Malfoy recognises you, and in this light from such distance. And I've known the two of you much longer. And…"

"Shouldn't we get to business?" Draco asked, tilting his head at the last word, not paying any more attention to the unwanted Weasley. "We've got some figures to go over…"

"But_ this one_ here…" Harry started in an accusing tone of voice, but couldn't finish as Malfoy grabbed hold of his arm and tore him away from George, who in turn took this as his cue to run for the door. Stumbling over the chairs, and tables, and flowers, and the cages of hamsters, and bouncing off the wall for a couple of times, he finally made it to the door.

"See you at dinner," Draco shouted his goodbye to George as he was closing the door, adding to Harry, "It was just a lucky guess about the name. 50-50 chance, you know."

Once outside, George leaned against the already sun-warm wall of the pub, panting. This day was promising a lot of trouble for him, a lot of embarrassment, and a lot of angry people. Still, George was no coward (now that he was out of immediate danger), and after a moment strengthened up again, not to look such to the passing people.

Fortunately there weren't many of those at this early hour in this always abandoned bystreet, so George managed to regain some strength without being noticed by anyone. He slowly started to walk back to his shop, a plan, the details of which he wanted to discuss with Fred, forming in his mind.

The main point of the plan was to turn the chaos they had managed to create back in their favour. And George thought that this night, with all the family and friends and any other immediately concerned parties they had decided to push around being present, would be a perfect occasion to do some tricking and sneaking and pushing. He was so immersed in his thoughts of which products to use and how to make all the right people love each other and how to kill Fred for leaving him alone in this kind of trouble that he didn't even notice Flitwick until the professor squeaked on their collision.

"Oh, I'm sorry, professor," George said uncharacteristically, helping the tiny man up.

"It's alright, it's alright," Flitwick chirped, brushing the dust of the street off his robes. "I'm in no hurry, and it's such a nice weather! Besides, it's not like the office of the _Prophet_ will run away if I chat with you for a moment. It really is so nice to see you after such a while! And I must say I'm so glad that your sister is the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, a really brilliant girl she is, such a pity she's a Weasley."

"What? Why?" George asked, having already lapsed into a stupor during Flitwick's speech to think out more ways to clean up all the mess Fred had caused (it was always Fred's fault, obviously), and waking from it now when he heard his name being mentioned.

"Ah, because I'd really have loved to have had her in my house! Such a _charming_ person!" He snickered at his own joke, trailing after George who hadn't even noticed that he had started walking to the WWW again. "And, between you and me," Flitwick added in his high-pitched voice so that if there had been any people in the vicinity of a few hundred feet they would have heard him without any problem, "I'm glad that Potter declined the post. He's not the kind of person for the job of teaching, too serious and sulky, if you get my meaning. Not easygoing enough. Kind of like Severus, in my opinion."

George wondered for a moment what Harry would say if he knew that Flitwick had compared his demeanour to Snape, but then decided he had other, more important problems to take care of. Those being namely professor Flitwick who was now telling him about how he was on his way to the office of the _Prophet_ to advertise for the opening of the job of Care of Magical Creatures. They had already reached the door of the Weasley's Wizard Wheezy's, so that George really needed to get rid of his old professor (it was never a good idea to have the any of the professors in their shop because most of their inventions were made for the student populous to use against the teachers).

"I'm sorry, professor, but I really need to get going now," he said as politely as he managed.

"Oh, of course, it was so nice meeting you again, Mr. Weasley. And before I forget, Severus asked me to give this to you," he handed George a sealed roll of parchment, "and do certainly give my regards to Fred, and the rest of your family, too, of course. Good day, Mr. Weasley!" And gone he was down the road towards the high building that housed the _Prophet_.

George stepped into the safety of their house, and exhaled deeply. A moment later something heavy flew at him, knocking him off his feet.

"Help me!" the something heavy, which turned out to be Fred, told him, shaking him by his shoulders. "It's Errol!"

"Yes, you were sleeping with him," George said, trying to wriggle out from his twin's grasp.

"Yes! But I think that he's…" Fred choked, let go of George, but didn't get up from the floor. After a moment he added in a small shaky voice, "I think he's dead. I killed him!"

* * *

**Note:** Ack! Nooo! Not Errol! But I did love the rest of this chapter, especially that 50-50 chance part. :D So, what do you think of it?


	7. By His Side

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 7: By His Side**_

"Hermione!"

She stopped and turned towards the fireplace, rather surprised to see the head of one Weasley twin looking back at her. It wasn't the fact that he was there that amazed her because in addition to everything else the twins also had an uncanny ability to be where you last expected when you last expected, especially when it was somewhere they weren't supposed to be. But it was the aspect of calling that caused her amazement. The twins never called to ask whether it was all right to come, they just came and refused to acknowledge the idea of coming back some other time, even if she told it to them many times in a loud voice. And it wasn't just the twins, she mused. Even Ron and Ginny did that, much to her bemusement.

"Hermione, you must come at once!" George urged him. "It's an emergency!"

Everything about George told her that it really was an emergency. After all, she had specifically and repetitiously forbidden anyone to use her office fireplace for anything else than an emergency. Not because it was something that could get her sacked, not with everyone else using it mostly for their personal affairs. In fact, she got only a few work-related calls through it, and the majority was from her boss who was too lazy to walk a few corridors to her office, saying that the meaning of being in charge was having other people run instead of him.

No, the real reason she didn't like taking personal calls from her office was that this was the only place nowadays where she could get away from all those people needing something from her. True, her patients needed something from her as well, but after she had de-cursed them, they didn't pry about her personal life, demand dirty details, or shake their heads and say that **they** thought she was out of her mind. Well, at least most of the time.

Not that Hermione had anything against her friends. She knew what they were and loved them anyway. It was just all their attention, and all of the media's attention, plus Draco who did not like to be ignored that sometimes drove her crazy. Girl's got to be alone sometimes, and this was her time. Lately people didn't get themselves cursed as much as before, and the free time she spent with research. And with attempts to get different Weasleys out of her office.

"What is it?" she asked with a sigh. She had just started reading a new book – "Useful Herbs in Modern Healing" – and was currently in the middle of a fascinating paragraph about the author's early notices concerning the use of Cackling Cactus milk against boils.

"It's an emergency!" George wailed. "We need your skills!"

The last time the twins had had an emergency that had required her skills was when Fred had eaten a canary cream gone bad and George had been dead sure that there was no crime bigger than robbing her of the opportunity to see the sight. And take a couple of photos. And call to everyone else so that they could see it as well. And pose with Fred. And walk along Diagon Alley to take photos of the twins and any passer-by crazy enough to pay 3 Sickles for that. It was amazing how many people were actually willing to do it.

"It's Errol," George continued. "Fred slept with him and now he's dead."

He paused and thought a little, before adding, "Errol. Not Fred."

Hermione opened her mouth only to snap it shut a moment later. If only they had taught it in Hogwarts how to react to the news of your best friend's older brother sleeping the family owl to death. But all the really useful skills could be learnt only from life itself.

"I'll be right there," she said, marked her place and closed the book. Some day she would be just as crazy as the twins, and then nothing could bother her any longer. It was definitely something to live for.

--

Whether for her expertise as a Healer or the glaring obviousness of the fact, the first glance she sent to the owl told her that he was not in the best shape. Of course, as long as she had known him, Errol was never in the best shape. But now he looked more like a dish rag than ever before, and even worse than Fred after eating that fateful canary cream.

"Is he dead?" George asked, his voice breaking.

Hermione stepped closer to the bed, where the twins had made the old owl as comfortable as possible, and moved her wand over him. She frowned, and did it again, and then for the third time as well.

"He's dead, isn't he?" the note of resignation rang clear in his voice.

"I'm sorry," she said.

Silence overtook the room.

"He was old," she added in a moment. "And it was a painless."

"For him, yes," Fred muttered. "But Mum is going to kill us."

"You," George corrected. "I'm not the one who slept with him."

"But you're the one who told me to intercept the owl!"

"But not this owl! Ginny's owl!"

Hermione raised a brow. There seemed to be a bit more to this than the twins' usual bickering. The had wanted to intercept Ginny's owl. Why would they want that?

"Why would you want to intercept Ginny's owl?" she voiced her question, hoping against all hope that the twins were so occupied with their arguing that they forgot to deny it.

No such luck.

"What about Ginny's owl?"

"What has Ginny's owl got to do with this?"

"Ginny has an owl?"

"Who's Ginny?"

"What's an owl?"

"Who are you?"

"Who am I?"

Hermione sighed and rested her head upon her hands, causing several looks cross the room, and some reach her, as well. The twins were having a voiceless conversation, did some voiceless arguing, and in the end came to a voiceless agreement.

"I'll walk you back, Hermione," Fred offered.

"You mean you'll walk those three steps with me to that fireplace?"

"I'll take you to dinner."

"It's eleven in the morning."

"I'll take you to breakfast."

"Breakfast at eleven?"

"Oh, just come with me!"

When Fred had pretty much dragged her out of the room, George took a seat on the bed and looked the sorry form of their dead owl.

"You are in a better place now," he muttered. "With lots of mice, and people delivering all the letters for you. And a bottomless pile of owl treats. And no windows. Or milk jugs. Or anything else to fall into, kick over, or fly against. You'll have lots of fun there, old boy."

--

"So what did you want to talk about?" Hermione asked, snatching her arm away from the twin, and giving him a warning look.

"Oh, cheer up, 'Mione. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and you are in the best company there could ever be!"

"I need to get back to work," she crossed her arms with a glare. "And don't call me that!"

"Draco calls you that," Fred shrugged, noticing how her glare went from angry to murderous.

"Your point?" she demanded.

"Nothing," he said quickly. "I just wanted to talk about…"

"Yes?" Hermione prompted, the curiosity dissolving some of her anger.

"About… about…"

Fred stopped and took a gulp of air. He was a Gryffindor after all. Brave and all that. Some would even call him reckless. He had survived Voldemort, angry Molly, and several prank wars with George. Asking Hermione about her (love) life was a piece of cherry pie compared to that.

"About Harry and Ginny!"

He had better calm her down before the big question. It was a smart thing to do. And why not get some advice at the same time?

"Ginny's got a new job, hasn't she? That's what today's dinner at the Burrow is about – celebrating her new job. Only I don't know what it is," she ended, sounding a bit disappointed.

"She'll be the DADA teacher and that's the problem because…"

"She got a job at Hogwarts?" Hermione exclaimed, so loud that several people around them stopped and turned to look.

"Yes, and now she has to…"

"But that's wonderful!" the girl screeched, forgetting all about respectable behaviour in public places. "Oh, she is going to teach! I almost envy her."

"Yes, that's great, but now…"

"I have to talk to her. I've read a couple of really good books that could be used for teaching Defence. She might not find them because some are rather specific and sometimes the oddest books have just this one chapter describing the essence of counter-curses better than ten others written on that subject only. For example, there was one on household charms that…"

Fred stopped listening and rubbed his head. At least he had managed to get the girl into better spirits. Now he had to make her angry again – she was much easier to talk to then.

"Are you happy, Hermione?"

"And there was this book which was actually about, can you believe it, Quidditch, but on page 42 it had this useful tip on how to fight against…"

"You read a book about Quidditch?" Fred exclaimed, promptly forgetting all about his reason of taking her out to this walk.

"Well, I…" she started, blushing and looking generally guilty, and Fred felt the ground slipping away from under his feet. Hermione was reading about Quidditch and Ron was reading about something else than Quidditch… if this wasn't the end of the world, he didn't know what was. Well, this would certainly explain some other things, like Snape buying a Daydream Charm, Charlie trying to kill him, and Luna lusting over Ron. Eww!

He must have gone dead pale in the face because now Hermione was giving him a concerned look instead of the guilty one, and asking slowly and gently,

"Fred, are you all right?"

The world was going to end. And he hadn't even had lunch yet. And he hadn't got the chance to test their newest and most wonderful invention on Snape. He hadn't even tested it on George. And the dinner tonight at the Burrow, all that wonderful food Mum had cooked specially for them, now he would never get to devour it. He would never see his little sister, or toast to her getting the job, or see George getting killed by Harry for taking Ginny away from them. He would never get the chance to tell everyone about Errol, and get yelled at for sleeping with him. He would never… wait a second. Just wait a bloody second. If the world was going to end, there would be no reason for him to worry about Harry and Ginny, or dirty-minded professors, or being blamed for Errol's end. There would be no more unwanted visits from Snape, stupid brothers faking drunkenness, or weird Ministers speaking about ketchup. Although that last part wasn't so bad, really.

"Yes, I'm fine," Fred announced rather cheerfully and then, since it wouldn't hurt asking, especially with the coming doom, went on to inquire, "why are you reading about Quidditch?"

"I'm not," Hermione snapped, hiding her guilt behind the anger.

"Sure you aren't," Fred agreed, his eyes sparkling. "Just like Ron isn't reading _Hogwarts, A History_."

"Ron is reading _Hogwarts, A History_?" she spoke carefully, placing each word in its correct place as if this would make the sentence easier to understood. Fred could almost see her brain cells sizzling with energy and tiny lightning jumping around like a grasshopper with a bad case of hiccups.

"Yes," he nodded, not seeing the point in lying or keeping quiet about it. Well, the point had definitely been there, dancing naked in front of him and singing terribly off-key, but he had solved the problem by pushing it down the deep abyss that had conveniently opened up beneath him.

"I saw him with the book in the Hamster," he explained. "George saw it, too."

--

"Hermione is going to murder Ron," Fred declared happily to George. There was no reason to worry about anything, because the world was going to end, one way or another.

"Perhaps we could skip that dinner tonight?" his twin suggested.

"No," Fred shook his head. "I refuse to face doom on an empty stomach."


	8. It's the End of the World

**Note: **We'd like to thank everyone who has read and/or reviewed our story, or will read it in the future. :) The Reviewer of the Indefinite Period of Time Award goes to _flamingbunnies _and _1moonwitch_ - thank you, thank you, thank you for all of your lovely reviews. :D

And here's the chapter.

* * *

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 8: It's the End of the World**_

The day wore on as peacefully as any sleepy August day could at a location like the WWW. George was at the counter, cashing in money, while Fred was accompanying a pair of pre-Hogwarts age girls around the shop and promising them discounts on almost everything they wanted and quite a few they shouldn't even be allowed to know about.

"You'll get it for just three Galleons and four Sickles," Fred promised when he noticed the girls' eyes lighting up in admiration of the expensive eight-Galleon Wicked Witch Mix boxes.

"But I only have three Galleons and two Sickles and four Knuts," one of the girls whined.

"Alright, on today's special occasion you'll get it for three Galleons, two Sickles and four Knuts," Fred beamed at them, and took one of the boxes down from a shelf too high for either of the girls. The two quickly took it and ran over to the counter, and Fred started looking around the shop to find another customer he could help.

"Eight Galleons," George strictly told the girls when they placed the box on the counter.

"No, three with two and four," the more outspoken of the two answered.

"The other you told us that," the shier supplied with a forced nod.

"Fred!" George shouted over the bustle of the shop, and every single conversation died down.

"What is it?" Fred asked from where he was showing their cold air balloons to some toddlers and their fathers.

"What is this?" George replied with the same question, pointing at the Wicked Witch Mix box.

"The Wicked Witch Mix," Fred replied, and casting a quick look at the variety of faces following their every word, added in his advertising mode, "variety of tools to help you catch a wizard's heart."

"And how much does it cost?" George asked.

"Only today, for the special occasion, three Galleons and four Sickles," Fred shouted over the shop, and watched in satisfaction almost all witches moving to that part of the shop.

"What special occasion?" George demanded when most of the bustle had moved behind the shelves whence only a few limbs of fighting women could be seen every once in a while, and the seething look in his eyes had managed to make Fred go to the counter. The two girls had managed to vanish in the meantime, leaving the box alone between two redheads.

"Well, the world is going to end today," Fred explained. "I just thought that we might get some good business done first."

"It's not good business if we sell them for less than their production cost," George hissed.

"Oh," Fred said, and thought for a moment. "I suppose it isn't."

"Sorry, girls," he shouted towards the mass still huddled together between the shelves, but luckily not breaking anything (Well, the twins weren't completely brainless. They knew that strong Hermione-cast Less-Mess spells in their shop could give them hours of time for more enjoyable activities than, for example, cleaning).

No one heard him.

"Sorry, girls," he tried again, this time casting a _Sonorus_ charm on himself first.

About a dozen of impatient eyes turned to him.

"It's five…" he started, but from the corner of his eye he saw George shaking his head. "No discount today," he said, giving his twin an alright-you-win-but-it's-your-fault-if-we-have-a-hundred-boxes-of-Wicked-Witch-products-unsold-when-we-die look.

George answered with a bit conceited at-least-we-won't-be-completely-broke look while the horde of witches left their shop in unanimous disappointment.

"Look what you did now," Fred accused when the door had closed again and they seemed to be left alone in the shop.

"I prevented us from getting bankrupt!" George exclaimed. "Look what you did yourself!"

"What did I do? I did nothing!" Fred answered. "I just…"

A small cough from behind silenced him. The twins whirled around at the disturbance as one.

"No discount even for old school friends?" Parvati Patil asked, giving them a look which they would have considered rather seductive and quite amusing if they hadn't known what an evil day this was.

"No, not even for old school friends," George answered quickly, fearful of what Fred might do if he let him say anything, and at the same time considering whenever he had been friends with Parvati.

"A pity," Parvati said at that, but made no attempt to leave the shop, instead staying right where she was, in the dark corner, almost hidden behind a high stack of boxes.

After a while of staring and doing nothing, Fred finally got his courage together (it was rather discouraging to see a person you only know by face suddenly flirting with you on your own territory; and with your brother, too) and asked, "Is there anything we can help you with?"

Parvati gave a nervous smile.

"Yes. And you're doing it perfectly."

George shared a look with Fred, feeling immensely relieved to find just as much confusion on his twin's face as he was feeling himself. They both turned their gazes back to Parvati and stared on, the silence again getting uncomfortably long.

"Of course," George finally decided to say something. "We do everything perfectly."

"But may we, perhaps," Fred took the line over, then tossed it back to George.

"—know, what it is—"

"—that you're hiding from," Fred finished.

Parvati smiled again nervously.

"Flitwick," she whispered, and nodded serenely, as if this explained everything.

George, though, didn't think it explained anything.

"Flitwick? Cheery, jumpy, _small_ Flitwick?" he asked.

"Yes, Flitwick," Parvati breathed even more silently.

"Erm… why?" Fred asked, forgetting that this day could never bring anything good and that it wasn't a good idea, therefore, to encourage it to bring on anything.

"Because he came to bring an advert to the _Prophet_ and then refused to leave and asked about all the people who were at school at the same time with me and about everyone in my family and about the distant cousin of the childhood friend of the girl who slept in the next bed from my sister…"

Parvati looked so desperate that George felt some feeble form of tact rising its head somewhere in his conscience and refrained from bursting out laughing. Instead he chose to try to comfort Parvati.

"Oh, so you're the new editor of the _Prophet_?" he asked, changing the subject.

Parvati brightened almost immediately, then slumped down again.

"Yes," she said. "And that's why I had to deal with Flitwick. They have a job opening at Hogwarts…"

"Not any more," Fred inserted, now clearly remembering that this was not a good-intentioned day, and deciding that keeping Ginny's secret did not much matter any more.

"No, they have, he told me," George cut off his brother.

"But didn't Ginny…" Fred started, but George shook his head and Fred fell silent again.

"CMC," he explained. Fred looked at him, his face bleak and empty, and Parvati's expression was, too, one of complete bafflement. "Care of Magical Creatures," he sighed.

For a while silence reigned, during which Fred's brain processed this new knowledge, Parvati smoothed her robes nervously, and George tried to make the enormously difficult mental three-piece jigsaw puzzle provide him with a picture that wouldn't equal the end of the world.

"Then, perhaps, we can still save the day!" he explained suddenly, making Parvati jump in her hiding place, hit the stack of boxes, and cry out in surprise when the precariously balanced stack, instead of crumpling down all over her, remained firmly in its place.

"Ow," she said with an irritated glance towards he boxes, "what do you mean, save the day? Somehow torture Flitwick?"

"Amongst other things, perhaps," George remarked slyly. Fred did his best to match George's smile, but as he had no idea what his twin was talking about, it proved rather difficult.

"I like Flitwick," he said when he failed to look as sly as he wanted. "But I don't like Charlie. Could we torture him instead?"

"But I don't like Draco," said George at the same time as his brother complained about his other brother.

At the same time Parvati had started to chant under her breath, "Torture Flitwick, torture Flitwick, torture Flitwick…"

"And I think," Fred added, looking at Parvati with annoyance, "that I have a perfect plan on how to do this."

The twins exchanged a meaningful glance, turned simultaneously towards Parvati, then pointed both of their right hands towards the door and, in unison, ordered, "Out!"

Parvati was surprised to silence. She looked hesitantly at the door, then turned back to the twins.

"But what should I do?"

"You should… erm…" Fred said, wracking his brain.

"You should come to the dinner at the Burrow today," George quickly piped in. "Then you can be a part of our plans of torture."

"Really?" Parvati's face lit up. "You'll let me help you with torturing Flitwick? Thank you!" She hugged both brothers and almost ran out of the shop.

After the door had banged shut behind her and the twins had stared at their empty shop for a while, George finally asked, "Torture Flitwick?"

"I have no idea what she's talking about. I was thinking about torturing a completely different unbelievably insufferable git."

"Of course," George nodded enthusiastically.

"But you did mention torturing Flitwick," Fred reminded his brother.

"I did?"

"You did."

"Ah, I suppose I did."'

"And how?"

"How did I mention it?" George was baffled.

"How do you plan to torture Flitwick."

"As a side effect."

"A side effect?"

"A side effect."

"Of what?" Fred prodded further.

"Saving the world."

"You're going to save the world?"

"No, we're going to save the world."

"So the world's not going to end today?"

"No, not today."

"You're sure?"

"I'm sure," George nodded.

"You just asked the most irritating woman you have ever met to come to the dinner at the Burrow, and you really believe that the world's not going to end?" Fred asked, his eyes so big from astonishment that he looked rather similar to a toad.

"Well… I did, didn't I?" George blushed.

"You did." Fred nodded.

"But… but we'll say in a loud voice when we arrive that she's his date and just arrived with us because we happened to chance into each other before coming!" George found a solution.

"Great plan!" Fred congratulated him.

"I know!" George said, took an invisible hat from the shelf, put it on and performed a dancing routine which clearly said he was so pleased with himself that even receiving the Order of Merlin, First Class, would be a trivial thing compared to what he had just come up with.

Fred watched his brother's headless jumping body for a while, shrugged, took another hat and joined in.

After a while of jumping, leaping, hopping, bouncing and occasionally shrieking in the midst of it all, they fell over in laughter and took off the hats. They spent some time panting and leaning on the counter, but as that soon proved not to be very amusing, Fred brought up the subject they had discussed earlier.

"But still, about torturing Flitwick?"

"When Ginny announces her new job…" George started, then stopped to look at his brother as if he was about to enlighten him about some secret conspiracy.

"Care to enlighten me about your secret conspiracy?" Fred asked.

"… at Hogwarts…" George continued with a smile that said '_I really did get all the brains_'.

"Yes?" prodded Fred.

"And Harry runs off in anger and devastation and horror and all other those things…"

"And supposing he doesn't blow up the house…"

"We'll tell him…" George stopped for a dramatic pause before publicising his ingenious plan.

"That he can become the teacher of Magical Creatures!" Fred finally caught up, beaming with joy.

George looked at him in annoyance.

"You just ruined my wonderful dramatic pause."

"I did?" Fred gave him a look that spoke loudly of surprise, naïveté, honesty, and glee at having outsmarted his twin.

"You watch the shop," George said, turning his back to his beaming brother whose smile began to fade just as quickly as George's legs carried him to the door of the shop and the invisible hat was flying towards him as a deadly… hat. "I'll go and… I don't know, have a drink at the Hamster or something… "

"Only if you promise…" Fred started, but was cut off by the bang of the door. "…that the world really won't end today," he finished into the silence.


	9. You'll Survive, Probably

**Note:** Sorry for the long wait. I suppose the fact this chapter is longer than usual won't make it up to you? Nah, probably not. But I hope it still helps. And if it doesn't, _Larix_ did say something about getting to write the next chapter soon.

* * *

**The Weasley Kind of Help**

_**Chapter 9: You'll Survive, Probably**_

Three hours, forty-seven minutes and fifteen seconds had never felt this long for Fred, who had to face all the unimaginable horrors this day still had up its sleeve all alone in their joke shop. George, gone for a drink at the Hamster, or at least that's what he had said he would do, didn't seem to be hurrying back to rescue his twin from those horrors the day was saving for them, probably the worst ones for last. Fred half-hoped that whenever he was, something terrible was happening to him there, while the rest of him was ready to forgive George anything as long as he still showed up before going to the Burrow for the dinner of doom. His twin had assured him that the world was not going to end yet, but now with George gone for already three hours, forty-three minutes and fifty-two seconds, Fred was starting to doubt his brother's wisdom.

Three minutes and thirty-three seconds later George walked into the shop, ostensibly unhurt, unterrorized, and generally unperturbed, looking like he had left his brother to imagine all the unimaginable horrors to come for a measly twenty-one minutes. Also, for being gone for such a long time, George looked oddly sober. This made Fred suspicious.

"You haven't been making plans on how to stop the world from ending without me, have you?" he accused, feeling rather hurt at his own brother behaving so thoughtlessly towards him. First it had been Charlie, now it was George. He really hadn't done anything to deserve that. Not recently, at least.

"What? No, why would I need that? Why have already planned all the important stuff, and with everything else we just improvise, like always."

Fred still wasn't sure how their plan would torture Flitwick as a side-effect, but since he really had nothing against Flitwick, he figured it wasn't enough to question his twin's statement because he had clearly said _the important stuff_ and torturing Flitwick was certainly not as important as torturing a certain other person.

"Then what took you so long?" he asked instead, curious.

"Oh, Moody wanted to know what kind of security measures we have implemented on the shop, because he thinks someone has been to the storeroom and nicked all of his supply of non-alcoholic Firewhiskey."

"There's non-alcoholic Firewhiskey?" Fred frowned, unbelieving.

"Not any more."

"I bet it was Charlie," Fred muttered darkly under his breath. "I wouldn't put it past him, the scheming, plotting, manipulative... brother."

"I don't see what he would do with fifty bottles of it," George commented. "But then again, I don't see what anyone could do with non-alcoholic Firewhiskey. It's probably just coloured water.

"Well, we better close this place up now. We still have to pick up Parvati, and I don't want to be late to Mum's dinner. She doesn't like that, and we need to be there at the strategic time if we want to save the world. Besides, with all the people turning up for it, I don't want to arrive when all the good food stuff is already gone."

"Do we have to pick up Parvati?" Fred whined, thinking that enough troublesome people with enough troublesome problems and enough troublesome grudges against other troublesome people were already coming to that dinner.

"We've got to have Parvati!" George exclaimed, having trouble to believe that even without any brains his twin would make such a stupid suggestion. "We need her for our plans!"

"We do?"

"Don't you remember anything I told you before?" George despaired. "That we were going to announce that she was _his_ date and thus torture _him_?"

"Oh, right," Fred realized, having trouble to believe that with him having all the brains, he could have forgotten such an important detail, perhaps even the most important.

"Let's go pick up Parvati then," he agreed.

--

"Tell me everything! How are we going to torture Flitwick?" Parvati inquired for an umpteenth time, in a tone of voice she probably considered conspiratorial.

"All in good time," George told her.

"But obviously you have a plan," she didn't relent that easily. "What is it? Tell me, tell me, tell me!"

"Your ignorance of the plan is essential for it to work," Fred said, in a sudden flash of ingenuity.

"Really?" Parvati asked, with a mix of suspicion and awe.

"Yes," George said, a bit sour that the bolt of cleverness hadn't hit him instead. What a pity that it had to be wasted on Fred.

"I can't wait to see it in action," Parvati said in a dreamy voice, which indicated that she was probably dreaming about Flitwick getting tortured, which in turn was something neither twin wanted to think of. They really had nothing against Flitwick. Especially when compared to some dirty-minded Professors, like Snape and McGonagall.

Thinking about Snape, George couldn't suppress a frightened shiver, and then a jolt of sudden shock as he remembered that Flitwick had given him a scroll from Snape. Patting his pocket, he learned that the scroll was still there, but what he felt at that was quite opposite from relief. He didn't even want to imagine what might be in that letter, least of all to read it and find out that it was in fact even worse.

Fortunately for him, there was no time for it now, because they had just arrived at the Apparation area, and were ready to go. There was the slight problem of Parvati never being to the Burrow and thus needing to side-Apparate with one of the twins, which then resulted in a small voiceless argument of which twin would take her.

_I didn't want her to come at all_, Fred glared at his brother.

_Without her we cannot torture him_, George stared back.

_Oh yeah_, Fred rolled his eyes, then announced, "Come here, Parvati, let's go."

--

There was the ordinary bustle in the Burrow's kitchen and living-room with several people chatting amiably, others shouting greetings over the room, and Molly busily cooking the grand dinner. Ginny and Hermione were with her, ready and willing to help, but she merely shooed them away, because they were _guests_.

"I'm not a guest, Mum," Ginny protested, as Molly was practically pushing her out of the door.

"This is your dinner, Ginny. You should go and rest while you still can. I and your father are so very proud of you, and so is Percy, and soon everyone will be so very proud of you, when they learn that your new job is—"

"Yes, Mum, don't ruin the surprise yet," Ginny said, leaving the kitchen a bit less reluctantly than a moment ago.

"Hey, Mum!" the twins greeted in unison when the kitchen was empty save for the three of them and Molly.

"Fred! George! You are here early!" she exclaimed, lifting a pot from the stove to the table.

"Really?" Fred asked in surprise, as him and George were engulfed into a compulsory hug. Only when Molly finally let them go to save another pot from the fire, did her eyes land on the strange girl standing in her kitchen.

"Hello," she spoke to her with a smile. "And you are?"

"Hi, I'm Parvati Patil," said Parvati politely. "Nice to meet you, Mrs Weasley."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, my dear," Molly said amiably, turning to her sons with questioning and even slightly mischievous look, "I didn't know you were bringing a _friend_."

"She's not our _friend_," Fred was quick to explain. "She's actually someone else's date, and we just happened to meet with her on the way."

"Oh?" Molly asked curiously. "Who's date is she then?"

"Charlie's," Fred announced.

"Malfoy's" George spoke at the same time.

"Flitwick," Parvati whispered, not in reply to the question but trying to remind the twins that they hadn't come here to simply chat with their mother.

Molly frowned, not comprehending. She was about to repeat her question, when yet another pot started to screech and whine, demanding her attention, and making a mental note to inquire more about her sons' new _friend_ later, she ushered the three gently but firmly out of the kitchen.

--

Once in the living room, Fred appraised the scene with one quick glance. There was Dad, sitting on the sofa and speaking with such enthusiasm that he knew without a doubt he was talking of another Muggle gadget. Bill, Ron, and Harry were the ones sitting close enough to hear him, and they listened with a mix of amusement and annoyance. Well, Bill and Ron did, as Harry was sulking even more than usually. Well, he wouldn't be sulking for much longer, Fred realized with a proud grin.

Ginny and Percy were standing aside from the others, and from the looks of it he was giving her valuable advice on the matters of teaching and education. Fred was surprised and mildly horrified that Ginny was actually listening to him without a protest or yawn of boredom, but he quickly noticed that she was not listening to him at all, which was one of the less brilliant but nevertheless working ways to deal with Percy, but taking inconspicuous peeks at Harry instead. Well, that was only to be expected. She might have been having second thoughts about leaving him, although Ginny usually didn't doubt her decisions, which in turn showed how frustrated she was with all the Harry-not-making-a-move-at-her affair. But she wouldn't be frustrated for much longer, Fred promised with a bigger grin.

Another corner was occupied by Malfoy and Moody, perhaps discussing the Hamster problems. Fred hadn't known Moody was coming, but he didn't particularly care either way. He just hoped that they could deal with whatever it was they were talking about and wouldn't bother other people with it, because they were both looking aggravated and gloomy. Maybe the Hamster's profit this month was even more negative than before.

Hermione was nowhere in sight, and at the moment he was glad for that, because Ron was present, and he didn't want to imagine what would happen if they met. His logical side said that they had probably already met, but his practical side noted that it had happened without him there, and thus wasn't the same.

Charlie was standing alone by the window, looking so peaceful and untouched by the bustle that Fred simply had to interrupt his serenity. And luckily for him, it was all in accordance with his ingenious plan.

"Come on," he said to Parvati, taking her by the arm. "Let me introduce you to someone."

"Will they help us torture Flitwick?" she asked, brightening up immediately.

"If you ask him nicely," Fred promised, steering her across the room, to where Charlie was enjoying his last moment of solitude.

"Hey, Charlie," he greeted, gently pushing the unresisting girl towards him. "Have you met Parvati? Parvati, this is my brother Charlie. I'm sure you have a lot to talk about."

"Where are you going?" she stopped him when he tried to slip away, glaring at him mercilessly.

"Just a thing I have to take care of," Fred said, winking. "You know."

"But what about..." Parvati started, but the twin had already left, leaving her alone with this stranger he had introduced to her as his brother Charlie.

"Hey," she said, looking up at him suspiciously. Fred had told her he might help her torture Flitwick, but with the taken aback expression on his face, she started to doubt it.

"Hi," Charlie replied slowly, not knowing what he should think of what had just happened or say to her. Fred had acted peculiarly, but then again, he was Fred and he always acted peculiarly. He probably had a plan. The twins always had one.

There was a moment of awkward silence. Parvati fumed at being thrown away that easily, as she figured it was what Fred had wanted to do ever since he and his twin had picked her up from their meeting place in Diagon Alley. Charlie in turn racked his brain for any prank Fred might have had in mind when leaving this girl with him; he knew it was a pointless endeavour to figure out the twins' pranks before they happened, but he still tried to predict what they expected him to do next, so that he could do the opposite. Searching his surroundings for any invisible wires or extendible ears or the like, he couldn't find any, but that was a small consolation. The twins were up to something, that much was certain. Then again, the twins were _always_ up to something, so no news there.

He glanced back at the girl standing in front of him. The treacherous idea that perhaps this girl was as much a victim of the twins' prank as everyone else entered his mind, but there was the chance that this was exactly what they had wanted him to think. Still, it probably wouldn't hurt to ask.

"Are you Fred's girlfriend?"

"What?" Parvati exclaimed, waking from her thoughts. "No! Definitely not!"

"George's then?"

"Not a chance in hell! I'd never go out with either of them!" she insisted, her current anger with the twins bubbling at the surface.

Charlie smirked at the ferociousness of the statement, but decided to say something in the twins defence, not because he thought they served it, for they had uncanny abilities to make people mad at them, but because they were still his family.

"They're not that bad."

"Oh yeah?" Parvati fumed, luckily keeping her voice sufficiently low not to attract the attention of the others. "Well, what do you know, you..."

"Have known them since their birth and lived together for several years?" Charlie ended her sentence with a small grin.

"Oh," Parvati said, realizing her mistake. She frowned up at him for a while, gazing at him suspiciously, but when she finally voiced her question, it also held a touch of admiration and wonder,

"How _do_ you deal with them?"

Charlie laughed in reply.

"It's not always easy," he confessed. "But over the years I've come to the conclusion that it's best to laugh with them when they're laughing at you for catching you in some ingenious prank of theirs. And sometimes prank them back."

"And that makes them stop pranking you?" she inquired.

"No, of course not. But it's good for your bruised pride to see them in a tight spot for a change."

"I bet it is," she said with a small diabolic smile.

--

Fred, having joined his father, two brothers and Harry, was only half listening to Arthur excitedly talking about a thing called Distant Boss, which worked on things called Pretty-Rays, and taking frequent peeks at Charlie and Parvati, barely able to swallow his devilish laughter. He knew that Charlie was currently in great torture; of course he was talking and even smiling from time to time, but that was just because he wanted to be polite, while in reality whatever the girl was telling him bored him to death and he was desperately looking for a way out of the conversation, only there was no escape and should he find one Fred was there to stop him and drag him back to his prison, which he deserved for doing _that thing_ to Fred, but that was only the beginning of his revenge and he couldn't hold back his evil laughter for much longer.

"So what is this Distant Boss thing for?" he asked to distract himself.

"It's... well, it's..." Arthur looked lost for a moment, but then quickly brightened up. "I think it's for making your boss go away. I haven't got it to work yet, but I'm sure I will as soon as a find some pretty-rays."

"Batteries," Harry muttered under his breath, looking now quite openly at Ginny. "And it's remote control, not distant boss."

Nobody heard him, not even Fred, but Harry hadn't expected them to. Sitting here and staring at the love of his life, he had suddenly realized that with her going to Hogwarts, he wouldn't get the chance to do that for quite some time. He almost wished he had accepted the job himself, but the results would still be the same with the two of them apart from each other. It was probably the best, Harry tried to convince himself. Ginny wouldn't want to get back together with him, not after he had dumped her like that. And perhaps it was time for him to move on as well.

Frowning darkly, he sunk deeper into the sofa. He had never been good at lying, and he wasn't it now either.

--

On his way to his old room to see if their secret stash of emergency items hadn't been found and thrown out by Molly yet, George heard a unusual noise coming from Ron's room. There would have been nothing strange about the noise if he hadn't seen Ron downstairs just a moment ago, and he doubted he dared to break Mum's strict orders of "no apparating inside the house!" But even if he was, George wanted to know why, and so he slowly pushed the door open, hoping to catch his brother doing something he wasn't supposed to be doing.

Instead, he caught Hermione rummaging through Ron's wardrobe. Immediately George's brain was swarming with possible explanations for this, each one more plausible than the other, but before he managed to choose the one that suited best with his purposes, she had turned away from the wardrobe and noticed him, a guilty blush spreading on her cheeks.

"I wasn't doing anything," she announced harshly.

"Oh sure you weren't," George grinned from ear to ear.

"Oh, fine, I was!" Hermione confessed with irritation. "But I have every right to do it. He stole my book."

"What book?"

"My _Hogwarts, A History_ of course," she announced as if this was the sole possible answer.

"How do you know he stole it?" George inquired, not bothering to try to look inconspicuous. He knew he wouldn't manage it anyway, and he also knew that having caught Hermione red-handed, he had a cover-up story for looking this pleased with himself, and she probably wouldn't suspect that it was mostly because of the plan he was currently carrying out.

"Because you..." she stopped and gave him a quick look-over before continuing, "your twin told me he saw Ron with it."

"How do you know it was _your_ book?" George said with extra emphasis and a very meaningful stare. If he had attempted to make her confused and hesitating, he was doing something wrong, because she just rolled her eyes at him.

"Yes, of course, silly me," she remarked sarcastically. "There's always the chance it's Ron's book."

"It does sound pretty unbelievable," George conceded. "But have you ever considered that _maybe _he heard about you losing your book, and _maybe_ he knew how much it means to you, and _maybe_ he was ready to do anything for you, and _maybe_ he went and bought you a new one, and _maybe_ he's just waiting for the opportune moment to give it to you. _Maybe_ he even tries to read it, because you love it and he, well, loves you."

Hermione narrowed her eyes,

"What, exactly, are you trying to tell me, George?"

"We saw Parvati today," he announced instead. "She told us some pretty interesting things."

"About Ron?"

"About Malfoy."

She glared at him for a long moment, and he grinned back gleefully, because being gleeful was part of the plan and he performed it brilliantly, even if he did say so himself.

But apparently being gleeful wasn't enough, for when the moment passed, Hermione just shook her head,

"Nice try, George, but you have to do better than that."

"Fine, don't believe me," he sighed dramatically. "I'm only telling the truth. I'm only trying to help."

"If you want to help, help me find my book," she said, adding jokingly, "or Ron's book."

"Or you could just ask Ron," George shrugged.

"Or you could just get out and go prank someone else," Hermione huffed in reply, kneeling on the floor to look under Ron's bed.

"Oh Merlin, that's disgusting," George heard her say as he left the room. He was a bit tempted to turn back and see what disgusting things Ron had under his bed, but it was probably something dull like dirty socks and sandwich crumbs. Besides, he had to get to his room and upgrade their secret emergency stash with the few items he had brought with him before the dinner.

When that was taken care of, he remained seated on the bed, gazing apprehensively for the one object he had not put away, a scroll of parchment given to him by Flitwick from Snape. He wondered what was in it. He wondered whether it would be better to burn the scroll without reading it. He wondered whether he could pretend he never got it in the first place. Then Snape would be angry with Flitwick instead, and he had kept his promise to Parvati. But he didn't really want to torture Flitwick. And Snape would probably know he had received it anyway, or if not he might take Flitwick's word over his.

Perhaps it was better to just read the scroll and get over with it than fret about its content for the rest of the evening. It might distract him from the plan, for one. It might distract him from enjoying Mum's wonderful cooking, for another. Perhaps it wasn't that bad.

Who was he kidding? It was from Snape. Of course it was that bad.

Perhaps he could let Fred read it instead.

--

Once back downstairs, George looked around the living room, trying to spot his twin. He was rather surprised to see Charlie and Parvati talking in a way that might even be considered amiable. He was also rather annoyed because Parvati was supposed to be talking to someone else in the way that could be considered more than just amiable, and it had been Fred's task to make that happen, but _apparently_ Fred had other, more important things to do, like save Ginny from Percy's clutches. Which was a useless thing to do, because Ginny was perfectly capable of dealing with Percy herself.

George marched up to them.

"Fred, can I have a word with you? In private."

Ginny looked mildly amused, and Percy the exact opposite.

"You are not planning some silly prank for tonight, are you?" he asked suspiciously. "Because if you are, I strongly suggest that you reconsider your childish endeavours and..."

"Don't worry, Perce, you'll survive it," Fred thumped him on the back, making him flinch.

"Probably," he added, following George through the room.

"They are up to something," Percy announced solemnly as if he had revealed a shocking truth.

"When aren't they up to something," Ginny merely shrugged.

--

"What's this?" Fred said, looking at the roll of parchment in his hand.

"It's a letter. To you."

"From whom?"

"I don't know. It's your letter. I don't read other people's letters," George said, sounding as if the mere idea that Fred might suspect him in something like that insulted him deeply.

"Is this the letter Flitwick gave you from Snape that you are too afraid to read?" Fred hazarded a guess.

"I told you about that, didn't I?" George frowned.

"No, I just have incredible mental abilities," Fred beamed.

"I think it's incredible you have any abilities."

"At least I'm not afraid to read a letter," Fred announced.

"Then do it."

"If you insist," Fred said, breaking the seal. "Look at it this way – what could possibly be worse in this letter than the one Mum sent us when we got caught sneaking around the castle after the curfew disguised as House-elves?"

"Oh yeah," George remembered. "Those were good times. I liked that disguise. I can't believe it didn't work."

"We probably weren't humble enough," Fred offered.

"Perhaps."

There was a period of strained silence when Fred scanned the content of the letter, and George waited for him to start screaming. To his great surprise, his twin grinned instead.

"What does it say?" he asked with curiosity, unable to think anything that Snape had said in his letter that would make Fred grin.

"This is brilliant," Fred announced. "Read it yourself."

Extremely wary and expecting another prank, George nevertheless took the parchment from his twin and glanced through it, preparing himself for the worst. He didn't scream, but neither did he grin, and at the end of it he was confused at both the content of the letter as well as Fred's good mood.

"He wants to buy 100 Adult Daydream Charms because he discovered it makes his potion better than the traditional ingredients?" he recited what he had just read.

"Why else would he want it?" Fred asked.

There was another moment of pensive silence and then, finally, both twins started to scream.

"He wants them for the potion," they tried to convince each other and themselves once the initial horror had passed. "Of course he wants them for the potion."

"But what about that made you so happy before?" George asked.

"Because with such a big order, we better deliver it personally."

"You mean... we are going to Hogwarts?"

"We are going to Hogwarts," Fred confirmed.

"Do I need to be worried?" Bill asked amusedly, coming to fetch the twins to the dinner table, and noticing the expression they both wore.

"Don't worry, Bill, you'll survive," George told him.

"Probably," Fred added, and both followed their big brother into the Burrow's kitchen.

* * *

**End Note:** Still didn't get to the dinner part yet. Next time then. :)

You know, when I finished this chapter, I got the urge to read Parvati/Charlie fics, only to discover I couldn't find any! *gasp* I know it's not a very traditional pairing, but I've read worse, so... so I'm planning to write one in the future. :P But if you know any existing ones, please tell me. :)


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